Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images
Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images
Manchester United were booed off the pitch after the 3-2 loss to Brighton, having lost a 2-0 lead in an embarrassing performance.
The pressure is on for Michael Carrick after Manchester United’s third defeat in six games this season, which has led to boos and anger within Old Trafford. The response was loud on Wednesday, with United’s collapse against Brighton as baffling as it was concerning.
Carrick’s side lacked any desire, intensity, pace, or plan as Brighton were quite clearly the better-coached side and were several times fitter and more interested in winning the game. In particular, United had some terrible performers who don’t deserve to wear the shirt against Fulham. But two have almost certainly lost the faith of the manager.
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Ayden Heaven and Leny Yoro were atrocious for Manchester United
For over a year, United fans have wanted to catch a glimpse of the future of the defence with Ayden Heaven and Leny Yoro forming a centre-back partnership for the first time against Brighton. But despite excitement, both Heaven and Yoro had a disastrous showing and did themselves absolutely no favours in the quest for more minutes – which have been hard to come by under Carrick.
The two young defenders were like deer in headlights almost every time Brighton attacked, being run through with relative ease. They weren’t able to track runners, were caught flat-footed, and didn’t have the desire or fitness to sprint back in transition with both jogging back at various points, costing two of the three goals.
To caveat the performances, both are young, it was their first competitive start together, and also neither can be match fit right now with a serious lack of minutes this season. But the issues were so basic that they need to know better and should be better than that.
Heaven is, he has proven it at Stamford Bridge and in various other games in his nearly two years for the club. While Yoro has never looked like the £50m defender he was signed to be. Now, into his third season for the club, he is still trying and failing to find his feet at Old Trafford.
Carrick has always been reluctant to use either of them despite fans calling for their starts. However, after this performance, Carrick will feel vindicated, as quite clearly he was right with Harry Maguire and Lisandro Martinez a much better pairing right now.
That being said, defence is a massive issue for United and arguably, the entire department needs to be replaced from top to bottom. But by the time this happens, Carrick will probably be long gone.
So one big takeaway from this loss is that Heaven and Yoro shouldn’t be starting together again any time soon. In fact, ideally, both probably need a loan move to grow and improve.