With no European football and having been knocked out of both domestic cups, Michael Carrick’s side will lack crucial game-time
**From the article:**
Michael Carrick has certainly been afforded more time on the training pitch with his United players this season, for example, than he is ever likely to get again should he remain in the role beyond the summer.
**The downside is the long breaks between matches. For all the extra time to train, prepare and recuperate, those lulls can make it harder to gather momentum and then, on those rare occasions you do have a couple of matches in quick succession, it can feel like a shock to the system.**
Or at least that is how it looked to anyone watching United labour against the 10 men of Newcastle on Wednesday night, just three days after beating the 10 men of Crystal Palace.
And it was much the same at West Ham last month, when United needed a stoppage-time equaliser three days after overcoming the 10 men of Tottenham.
**United start slowly and struggle for intensity**
This was Newcastle’s 29th match since the November international break and their longest break between games in that time was six days.
United, by contrast, have played 10 fewer games over the same period and **increasingly in recent outings – West Ham, Everton, Palace and now Newcastle – they have started slowly and struggled for urgency and intensity.**
**There were 13 days between United playing West Ham and Everton and it showed. The bad news is there will be more of that between now and the end of the campaign. United have an 11-day wait until they face Aston Villa at Old Trafford on March 15.**
**It gets even worse after that with a 24-day wait between the Bournemouth game on March 20 and Leeds, now that has been moved a couple of days to April 13.**
**Carrick must find a way to ensure it does not become a hindrance, an obstacle to their European ambitions.**
Newcastle was the third game in eight under Carrick in which opponents have had a man sent off and a golden opportunity to put some daylight between themselves and Villa.
With Unai Emery’s side losing heavily at home to Chelsea, United would have gone three points clear of them with a victory over Newcastle.
Instead they remain separated only on goal difference chasing Champions League qualification while Chelsea gained ground and Liverpool were relieved that their shock defeat by Wolves was not quite as costly as it may have felt the night before.
oldmonk_97 on
It’s hilarious, 1 result and everyone who was proverbially sucking off carrick and saying give him the job start their relentless attacks on the club. Yikes.
Vast_Variation1381 on
One loss and narrative switches. Sure, we’ve looked rough for 3-4 games now. That’s because we have a attacking mid/striker playing LW and no midfield depth – Casemiro has been good, and people have been overrating Mainoo’s performances. He’s still way too slow and lacks athleticism. We lost away at Newcastle which is always a tough fixture for us.
We’re in 3rd place. At the beginning of the season every fan would snatch your hand off to be in this position right now. Its exciting times. We’re in 3rd despite missing players, having an unbalanced squad and fired our manager mid season. 2 tough fixtures coming up next so lets see how we do.
This performance and game shouldn’t change peoples excitement. Newcastle didnt come to play football last night. They know how to play against us to kill momentum… just disrupt everything and anything you can. It felt like the ball was in play for only 1/3rd of the match lol. The ref was in a card giving mood for United players, so we couldn’t make challenges back because the Newcastle players were overreacting and the crowd influencing the refs judgement.
Sure they had a red card for simulation but honestly Newcastle could have had 3 or 4 players sent off on any other day. Dan Burn elbow, Trippier made god knows how many bad challenges plus screaming at the ref at HT, and Joelinton clapping the refs booking which is usually a second yellow and red.
JimmyNoBreaks on
Now how will Malacia build up his match fitness?
Fisktor on
Have we had a game with 90 good minutes this season?
thrulim123 on
‘Incompetent , underqualified, overrated ex-player Michael Carrick leads Man Utd to worse record (single loss) of 2026’
Summary of every article in the upcoming days
Benphyre on
It’s time to get the players holidays again. Lesser training because the players don’t need it
mailaise-oaf on
Best case scenario Carrick secures CL qualification and United appoint a top manager in the summer
Basic-Kale3169 on
Honestly, this defeat is good. Our fans were becoming too arrogant and completely brainless. The consensus was that Carrick was by far the best option as a manager for next season.
Anyone who says that before the season has ended is an idiot.
I’m rooting for Carrick, and I hope he demonstrates that he will be our coach. But he needs to secure top 4 first which is far from guaranteed.
And you don’t judge someone based on 10 games, half of them where we played shit football. We did that with Ole, when Bruno was pulling record breaking stats. The same thing is happening now.
kafqatamura on
we are officially medium rare
mljh11 on
Ah, the dark part of the United news cycle – twisting the knife in whenever a loss occurs.
But the lack of intensity part is undeniably true. How long has the club been suffering from this malaise? It seems like it’s always been the case even as far back as during Solskjaer’s tenure, when the team would often start lackadaisically, lose a goal and then have to rally and come back from behind. I’m struggling to recall if this was also true under LVG and Mourinho, or if those two squads were set up more rigidly and could therefore disguise this weakness.
Mr_Potato2025 on
I honestly don’t think some friendlies would be the worst idea, maybe closed door ones like we’ve done previously
EndFeeling9912 on
Oh, the telegraph…
Locko2020 on
How quickly Mainoo reverted to just standing around after putting in a lot of work initially under Carrick is annoying.
Speedodoyle on
If Mbeumo and Yoro score those sitters, then we win and the narrative is so different. Fine margins. It’s one loss, let’s keep moving forwards.
thatclassy on
This is such a narrow minded view. No one in the big 6 is blowing past teams in their games. Arsenal scraped by with a 1-0 win, city drew, Liverpool lost, Chelsea won this week but last their last game and drew prior to that. Carrick has come in as an interim and turned things around. Were people expecting him to go undefeated till the end of the season?
whitemythmokong24 on
Malacia was undercooked lol. I think SAF would throw in an academy grad rather than Undergarte and Malacooked if he was in that situation
garynevilleisared on
The overreactions to yesterdays loss was honestly embarrassing. This is still a team that had its manager sacked, and most of these guys had another sacked before too. We werent going to stay undefeated for ever. Im excited to see how Carrick responds. This is part of the test.
andrewlikereddit on
Didn’t we have to do a match for sesko thing? Why dont we organiz it now.
docshiz on
We have 2 matches in the next 15 days, then an international break. The clickbait phrasing is wording it like we don’t play again for another 3 weeks and then not again until 3 weeks after that?
![[Ducker] Man Utd already looked undercooked... and now they have two games in 39 days](https://www.eucup.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/Rq10-TeORD7QftgvH6MkhlUGs1pPHOF1dtkw7uD2wnU-1024x576.jpeg "[Ducker] Man Utd already looked undercooked… and now they have two games in 39 days")
20 Comments
With no European football and having been knocked out of both domestic cups, Michael Carrick’s side will lack crucial game-time
**From the article:**
Michael Carrick has certainly been afforded more time on the training pitch with his United players this season, for example, than he is ever likely to get again should he remain in the role beyond the summer.
**The downside is the long breaks between matches. For all the extra time to train, prepare and recuperate, those lulls can make it harder to gather momentum and then, on those rare occasions you do have a couple of matches in quick succession, it can feel like a shock to the system.**
Or at least that is how it looked to anyone watching United labour against the 10 men of Newcastle on Wednesday night, just three days after beating the 10 men of Crystal Palace.
And it was much the same at West Ham last month, when United needed a stoppage-time equaliser three days after overcoming the 10 men of Tottenham.
**United start slowly and struggle for intensity**
This was Newcastle’s 29th match since the November international break and their longest break between games in that time was six days.
United, by contrast, have played 10 fewer games over the same period and **increasingly in recent outings – West Ham, Everton, Palace and now Newcastle – they have started slowly and struggled for urgency and intensity.**
**There were 13 days between United playing West Ham and Everton and it showed. The bad news is there will be more of that between now and the end of the campaign. United have an 11-day wait until they face Aston Villa at Old Trafford on March 15.**
**It gets even worse after that with a 24-day wait between the Bournemouth game on March 20 and Leeds, now that has been moved a couple of days to April 13.**
**Carrick must find a way to ensure it does not become a hindrance, an obstacle to their European ambitions.**
Newcastle was the third game in eight under Carrick in which opponents have had a man sent off and a golden opportunity to put some daylight between themselves and Villa.
With Unai Emery’s side losing heavily at home to Chelsea, United would have gone three points clear of them with a victory over Newcastle.
Instead they remain separated only on goal difference chasing Champions League qualification while Chelsea gained ground and Liverpool were relieved that their shock defeat by Wolves was not quite as costly as it may have felt the night before.
It’s hilarious, 1 result and everyone who was proverbially sucking off carrick and saying give him the job start their relentless attacks on the club. Yikes.
One loss and narrative switches. Sure, we’ve looked rough for 3-4 games now. That’s because we have a attacking mid/striker playing LW and no midfield depth – Casemiro has been good, and people have been overrating Mainoo’s performances. He’s still way too slow and lacks athleticism. We lost away at Newcastle which is always a tough fixture for us.
We’re in 3rd place. At the beginning of the season every fan would snatch your hand off to be in this position right now. Its exciting times. We’re in 3rd despite missing players, having an unbalanced squad and fired our manager mid season. 2 tough fixtures coming up next so lets see how we do.
This performance and game shouldn’t change peoples excitement. Newcastle didnt come to play football last night. They know how to play against us to kill momentum… just disrupt everything and anything you can. It felt like the ball was in play for only 1/3rd of the match lol. The ref was in a card giving mood for United players, so we couldn’t make challenges back because the Newcastle players were overreacting and the crowd influencing the refs judgement.
Sure they had a red card for simulation but honestly Newcastle could have had 3 or 4 players sent off on any other day. Dan Burn elbow, Trippier made god knows how many bad challenges plus screaming at the ref at HT, and Joelinton clapping the refs booking which is usually a second yellow and red.
Now how will Malacia build up his match fitness?
Have we had a game with 90 good minutes this season?
‘Incompetent , underqualified, overrated ex-player Michael Carrick leads Man Utd to worse record (single loss) of 2026’
Summary of every article in the upcoming days
It’s time to get the players holidays again. Lesser training because the players don’t need it
Best case scenario Carrick secures CL qualification and United appoint a top manager in the summer
Honestly, this defeat is good. Our fans were becoming too arrogant and completely brainless. The consensus was that Carrick was by far the best option as a manager for next season.
Anyone who says that before the season has ended is an idiot.
I’m rooting for Carrick, and I hope he demonstrates that he will be our coach. But he needs to secure top 4 first which is far from guaranteed.
And you don’t judge someone based on 10 games, half of them where we played shit football. We did that with Ole, when Bruno was pulling record breaking stats. The same thing is happening now.
we are officially medium rare
Ah, the dark part of the United news cycle – twisting the knife in whenever a loss occurs.
But the lack of intensity part is undeniably true. How long has the club been suffering from this malaise? It seems like it’s always been the case even as far back as during Solskjaer’s tenure, when the team would often start lackadaisically, lose a goal and then have to rally and come back from behind. I’m struggling to recall if this was also true under LVG and Mourinho, or if those two squads were set up more rigidly and could therefore disguise this weakness.
I honestly don’t think some friendlies would be the worst idea, maybe closed door ones like we’ve done previously
Oh, the telegraph…
How quickly Mainoo reverted to just standing around after putting in a lot of work initially under Carrick is annoying.
If Mbeumo and Yoro score those sitters, then we win and the narrative is so different. Fine margins. It’s one loss, let’s keep moving forwards.
This is such a narrow minded view. No one in the big 6 is blowing past teams in their games. Arsenal scraped by with a 1-0 win, city drew, Liverpool lost, Chelsea won this week but last their last game and drew prior to that. Carrick has come in as an interim and turned things around. Were people expecting him to go undefeated till the end of the season?
Malacia was undercooked lol. I think SAF would throw in an academy grad rather than Undergarte and Malacooked if he was in that situation
The overreactions to yesterdays loss was honestly embarrassing. This is still a team that had its manager sacked, and most of these guys had another sacked before too. We werent going to stay undefeated for ever. Im excited to see how Carrick responds. This is part of the test.
Didn’t we have to do a match for sesko thing? Why dont we organiz it now.
We have 2 matches in the next 15 days, then an international break. The clickbait phrasing is wording it like we don’t play again for another 3 weeks and then not again until 3 weeks after that?