Manchester United, authors of 20 top-flight titles and three European Cups, enter the November international break a point off the bottom of the Premier League. The club’s lowest finish in 22 years was third place, and it has not finished higher than third in half a decade. It currently sits 18th, and there are more than half-hearted discussions about relegation to the Championship.
United have 15 players in the squad who cost at least $50 million to acquire, yet they look unlikely to find success over 90 minutes on a Premier League pitch.
There was no visible jubilation after the club, at home, came back from a pair of two-goal deficits to rescue a point against a fellow Champions League club. That is an immense problem, especially after a comeback win against AS Roma in the UEFA Champions League.
It is almost as if nobody in a United shirt knows how to respond to positive moments. The players are guarding their feelings like a middle-schooler who has heard their crush might like them back but cannot quite believe it. Put more strongly, they have become a walking fight-or-flight decision, never quite finding the relief of leaving fight mode.
Manager Michael Carrick is a likable figure and a legend from his playing days, but he appears over his skis in the job. Fans cannot decide who they like less: the administrators who put this team in their shirts and handed the full-time keys to Carrick, or the mostly shrinking players who are leaving him stranded in no man’s land.
Since Sir Alex Ferguson left, United have lost with a who’s who of managers who, if they were given a podcast together, would be the most downloaded show around. Two of their previous bosses have Real Madrid top of the Champions League table and AC Milan in a Serie A title discussion. Another has a rival Premier League club in the top-four conversation.
Manchester United by the numbers: a mentality problem
These numbers are going to perplex you, and some of them defy what you have seen watching the Red Devils this season. Manchester United entered the weekend with the following Premier League ranks:
- Shot attempts: 1st, by 15
- Set-piece goals: 20th
- Set-piece goals conceded: 19th
- Ground duels won: 10th
- Aerial duels won: 12th
You look at that and figure you are discussing a tremendously unlucky squad. The numbers make you want to write off the 19th-place start as poor finishing in front of goal. Those figures are bad, but if we are honest, they are 19th-place bad.
That is why United’s problem lies in their heads. This squad is talented enough to compete for a top-four spot, yet over vast stretches of their games they perform like a mid-table side. That alone would put most coaches in hot water, but United have taken mid-table and ridden it right down into the bottom three, thanks to mind-melting mistakes and a terrible lack of focus and commitment to the minute-by-minute.
If Jurgen Klopp had his Mentality Monsters at Liverpool, Carrick has Melancholic Messes. This United side seems to concede at the weirdest times and in the most avoidable situations. They switch off like a faulty fuse and are perhaps the best side at reading the post-match hymn sheet.
This is one of the biggest clubs in the world, and these results are unacceptable. Performances like this are not good enough at the biggest club in the world. Effort is the bare minimum, and United simply have not been good enough.
The struggles scream even louder because Carrick appeared to have cleaned up a messy ship last season. He took Ruben Amorim’s out-of-order team and reassembled it into a working unit that climbed into third place on the table. Only one player of consequence has left that team: Casemiro. United bought three players to fill his spot, yet ten games in, the situation in midfield remains unsettled and at times looks untenable.
Strong players have been sent packing in pursuit of improvement, including legends of the game such as Casemiro and homegrown talent such as Scott McTominay, the 2024-25 Serie A Player of the Year. Meanwhile, others remain on the strength of yesteryear’s performances. For many years, the club was known for out-performing logical conclusions, snaring wins from lesser performances and even stretching the clock into the magical “Fergie Time” at the Theatre of Dreams. Perhaps the problem is that United are still measured by a champions’ yardstick, even though they have not fitted the description for ages.
Carrick is not the man for the job long-term, and he does not have the tactical acumen or managerial experience to steer this ship back into a top-four finish. To be fair to him, he was never going to decline the job, and there were reasons to hope he might show skills we had yet to see in his managerial career. He is not going to resign from a club he loves so much. He is stuck, and given how big a decision it was to give him the job full-time, the club is stuck with him too.
Whether United cut ties with him during the international break or let him ride this out until January, the club needs to find solutions for this current team. It was admirable that United fought back from one two-goal deficit and then did it again to earn a point. They bailed out their keeper and then themselves. But most clubs would still be celebrating that moment. This side looks like it is preparing for the next 2-0 deficit. Where will they finish? Would they take eighth today?