Manchester United's Struggles Under Michael Carrick
The mood around Manchester United was supposed to be different this year.
Michael Carrick’s calm authority, the surge to third place after he stepped in mid-season, the numbers that said United had been the best team in the Premier League in 2025 from January onwards – all of it fed a feeling that the club had finally found a steady hand.
Seven league games later, that optimism has drained away. And the echoes of Ruben Amorim’s ill-fated full season are getting harder to ignore.
Results: A Familiar Stumble
Strip it back to the basics and the picture is blunt.
After seven games of this campaign, Carrick’s United have won two and lost three. That’s exactly the same record Amorim posted at the same stage last season. You could even argue Amorim’s start was worse if you factor in the 2025-26 Carabao Cup penalty shoot-out exit to Grimsby, which technically goes down as a draw but felt like a defeat.
United have already repeated one unwanted theme this year: they are out of the Carabao Cup again, this time beaten by Brighton last week.
The league table is equally unforgiving. Five points from five games leaves United 12th – their joint-lowest tally at this stage of a Premier League season, matching the 2014/15 start under Louis van Gaal. Only newly promoted Ipswich have lost to them in the league.
Amorim’s early weeks hardly inspired confidence either. Six of his first seven matches last season were in the league, and United sat 14th after home wins over Burnley and Chelsea papered over a shaky foundation. Different managers, different styles, same uneasy glance at the standings.
Underlying Numbers, Same Old Story
Look beneath the surface and the parallels tighten.
Last year, the analytics offered Amorim some protection. On expected points, United sat fourth after seven games despite actually being 14th. The numbers suggested a team playing better than its results.
Carrick has a similar statistical cushion. This season, United are sixth in the xPts table, well ahead of their real position of 12th. The model says they should be higher. The league table shrugs.
The root cause is strikingly familiar: United create more than they finish.
Under Amorim at this stage last season, United had scored seven league goals from an expected-goals total of 12.04. A huge gap. This year, the difference is smaller but still significant – eight goals from an xG of 10.59.
In plain terms, they waste chances. Last season, that wastefulness eased as the year went on; United finished the campaign with an xG tally only a little over three goals higher than their actual total. The finishing caught up, at least partially.
So the data offers two readings. Either United are due a correction and the goals will come. Or this squad simply lacks enough ruthless finishers to turn decent performances into convincing wins.
Different Manager, Different Heat
What has changed is the temperature around the dugout.
Carrick walks into every press conference with credit in the bank. That third-place finish, the surge in form after his January appointment, and the sense of tactical clarity he brought have bought him time with both supporters and pundits.
Amorim never had that luxury. After seven games of 2025-26, the pressure was already suffocating. He had collected just 34 points from 33 Premier League matches overall and had failed to win back-to-back league games. The narrative was set early and it never really shifted.
His system became a lightning rod. The wing-back formation was hammered week after week, with many insisting a back four would suit the squad better. Amorim refused to bend. The perception was of a coach wedded to an idea that didn’t fit his players.
Carrick hasn’t been boxed in by a tactical label yet. The criticism after Sunday’s draw with lowly Fulham focused less on shape and more on attitude – specifically, a lack of intensity and work off the ball, backed up by the running and pressing data. That stings in a different way. Systems can be tweaked. Effort is non-negotiable.
Lessons from Amorim – and a Warning
Amorim tried to sound unruffled after his seventh game last season, a 3-1 defeat at Brentford. “I am never concerned about my job,” he said.
The results never truly turned. He clung on until January, and even then his departure felt as much about politics as performances after he openly criticised the board. When he left, United were sixth. He is now at AC Milan, unbeaten and two points off the pace in Serie A.
That arc hangs over Carrick’s early months. The club backed him in May with a permanent two-year deal. That gives him a platform, not a shield.
It is still too early for full-scale crisis mode. The sack talk hasn’t reached the volume that surrounded Amorim at this point. But the warning has already been issued from inside United’s own alumni.
“If those types of performances continue, he will find himself in a lot of trouble,” Gary Neville said on Sunday.
The numbers say United should be better off. The table says they are not. Carrick’s task now is brutally simple: turn the xG into goals, the performances into points, and the murmurs into momentum – before Old Trafford starts to sound the same way it did under his predecessor.
