Ole Gunnar Solskjaer will hold face-to-face talks with Manchester United on Saturday as he bids to become interim head coach until the end of the season.
Solskjaer is battling with Michael Carrick for the role after United sacked Ruben Amorim this week, although caretaker boss Darren Fletcher cannot be ruled out.
It’s understood that both Solskjaer and Carrick held preliminary discussions with the United hierarchy earlier in the week.
Carrick, 44, met with chief executive Omar Berrada and director of football Jason Wilcox in person on Thursday, and Solskjaer will have his interview at Carrington on Saturday.
It will be his first face-to-face meeting with the club’s hierarchy since Amorim was sacked.
Despite speculation the 52-year-old United legend is the favourite, the club have been giving serious consideration to Carrick who was Solskjaer’s first-team coach when he was manager between 2018 and 2021, and stepped in as caretaker after he was sacked. The notion of them working together again has now been dismissed.
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer (right) will speak to the Man United hierarchy over the interim manager role on Saturday, while Michael Carrick (left) has also held preliminary discussions
It’s understood that Fletcher has also made a good impression since stepping up from Under-18s coach to take temporary charge.
The 41-year-old Scot oversaw Wednesday’s 1-1 draw at Burnley and will be in the dugout for tomorrow’s (sun) FA Cup tie against Brighton at Old Trafford.
Fletcher insisted on Friday that there have been no conversations over his long-term future at the club when asked if he has spoken to minority owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe.
‘I’ve not, no,’ replied Fletcher. ‘I speak to Omar and Jason, that’s how the processes work.
‘For me, I’ve been focusing on the job at hand, preparing the team for these two games. There’s been no thoughts or conversations about my future.
‘Honestly, the people in charge, Jason and Omar, have given me full responsibility to take control of these two games, make my own decisions, lead the team, guide the team, prepare the team, and that’s what I’ve been doing.
‘There’s been no conversations with anybody outside of those two people in higher-up positions in the club.’
Two days after the draw at Turf Moor, Fletcher was still unhappy VAR didn’t take a closer look at an apparent stamp by Kyle Walker on Patrick Dorgu, having ‘ridiculously’ ruled out a goal by Lisandro Martinez for a foul on the former England defender.
Walker trod on Dorgu’s leg as he lay on the floor partially covering the ball at Turf Moor, but referee Stuart Attwell took no action and VAR decided not to intervene.
Darren Fletcher, who is caretaker boss, has an outside chance of landing the interim role
Fletcher compared that with an incident in the first half when Martinez’s effort was ruled out after Walker went down theatrically under his challenge at a corner.
Asked if the former Manchester City defender was lucky that Dorgu didn’t make more of the second incident, Fletcher replied: ‘So like Kyle Walker did when Licha didn’t touch him? Yeah. That’s the sort of the territory we’re getting into, but Patrick’s such an honest guy, he’s never going to do that.
‘It didn’t look great from Kyle Walker’s point of view, but I like Kyle and I know him as a person, so I hope the intent was to get the ball.
‘I think VAR should have looked at it. They looked at the goal disallowed, which was ridiculous, so they should have been looking at that.
‘If they don’t, you’re just going to encourage players making massive dramas out of things and being theatrical, which is what we don’t want in the game.’
Ruben AmorimOle Gunnar Solskjaer
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Ole Gunnar Solskjaer will hold face-to-face talks with Man United chiefs TOMORROW over interim manager role