Michael Carrick during an interview (Sky Sports)
Michael Carrick during an interview (Sky Sports)
Manchester United manager Michael Carrick has bizarrely suggested that it could be a good thing that his team don’t have a clear identity.
The Red Devils are on a poor run of form at the moment, winning only two of six games in all competitions so far this season.
Most recently, Man Utd lost at home to rivals Manchester City despite them being down to ten men for much of the game, and were then beaten 3-2 by Brighton in the Carabao Cup despite an early 2-0 lead for Carrick’s side.
Understandably, this is starting to lead to increased scrutiny on the new United manager, who was given the job after an impressive stint as interim manager last season.
Some MUFC fans might be worried, however, by Carrick’s latest statements on his team’s style of play.
Michael Carrick on Manchester United’s lack of identity
When asked about United’s identity by Sky Sports, Carrick suggested it could be a positive not to have one so that his side is unpredictable.
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“I quite like the fact that someone can’t work out the identity, to be honest, because that means you’re unpredictable,” Carrick said.
“So, from an attacking sense, we want to be unpredictable, you know? We don’t want to be being able to read what we’re going to do next or or what our main strength is.
“I think if we can if we can do a a good number of things well, and we can attack from different areas and different ways, for me, I’d rather have a team that that does that.”
Michael Carrick, Manager of Manchester United
Michael Carrick, Manager of Manchester United (Photo by Alex Livesey/Getty Images)
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While you can kind of see what Carrick’s getting at here, it’s probably not the message the fans want to hear right now.
Even if every team needs to be adaptable and unpredictable to a certain extent, it’s clear that whatever Carrick is trying to do isn’t really working.
United can surely still find a way to mix things up a bit whilst maintaining a clear identity and some core philosophy about how they want to approach most games.