Premier League pre-season winners & losers: From Liverpool’s worrying lack of depth to Aston Villa’s new striking sensation Brian Madjo
While there’s clearly nothing wrong with United’s academy (Shea Lacey had a very promising pre-season), Carrick won’t want to be relying on youngsters to fill the glaring holes in his squad – holes that were ruthlessly exposed by Ruben Amorim of all people.
There were reports ahead of Saturday’s friendly with AC Milan, that several figures at Old Trafford were determined to get one over on the club’s former manager.
However, despite twice taking the lead against Amorim’s new team, United slumped to a 4-2 defeat in Poland that made it painfully clear that Carrick doesn’t have anywhere near enough quality at his disposal to compete in the Champions League this season.
Remember, while the former England international undoubtedly did a fine job cleaning up the mess left behind by Amorim, he pretty much had a week to prepare for every Premier League game, with United already out of every cup competition when he took over on January 13.
The big question, then, going into the 2026-27 campaign is whether Carrick’s can cope with playing every three-to-four days. As it stands, you’d have to say that the answer is no – and you get the feeling that he agrees.
“We want more [players], we need more, we keep looking for how we can do that,” Carrick told reporters before the Milan debacle. “Money’s money, I get that. We feel like we have to be pushing for everything we’re involved in, while being realistic of what the recent history’s looked like over a period of time.
“For now, we’ve got to make the most of it, but we’ve got to push every boundary we can to be able to win again, basically. That’s the challenge.”
And how United deal with it will determine the success of their season – and indeed Carrick’s tenure.
