Manchester United head into the first derby of the 2026\/27 season with more questions than answers over their squad, as Manchester City arrive at Old Trafford for a meeting that also marks the first without Pep Guardiola in a decade.<\/p>\n
Michael Carrick\u2019s first full season has begun unevenly, with United collecting one win, one draw and one defeat to sit around mid-table. The bigger issue for Carrick, though, is availability. Several players remain unavailable, leaving United short of a full group for one of the biggest fixtures on the calendar.<\/p>\n
Carlos Baleba is still waiting for his debut after arriving in Manchester with an ankle injury sustained during his time at Brighton & Hove Albion. There is at least a possibility he could return for United\u2019s final match before the international break, when Fulham are due at Old Trafford on Sept. 20.<\/p>\n
Luke Shaw missed United\u2019s 4-0 win over Sabah FK on Thursday after coming off during the 2-2 draw with Everton. Carrick says the defender will be assessed before the City match, and there remains cautious optimism that he may recover in time.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ll have to see,\u201d Carrick said. \u201cWe just kind of looked after him a little bit. He wasn\u2019t quite ready for [Sabah] 100%, so we didn\u2019t risk it. We\u2019ll see how he is over the next couple of days or so.\u201d<\/p>\n
Amad Diallo has yet to appear this season after what Carrick called a \u201cniggle\u201d on the eve of the opening Premier League game against Hull City. He had previously been expected back before the September international break, but the latest indication is that his absence may extend for \u201clittle bit longer\u201d, possibly until October.<\/p>\n
Matthijs de Ligt has also been out for a long spell, with his last United appearance coming in the 2-1 win at Crystal Palace on Nov. 30 last season. After a difficult recovery from a back problem, he is now back in training, although he is still unlikely to feature before the international break.<\/p>\n
Manuel Ugarte is another player not expected back soon. The midfielder suffered a knee ligament injury while on international duty with Uruguay at the World Cup and is likely to miss the rest of the calendar year, even if a return before the end of the campaign remains possible.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
United enter the derby with injuries to Baleba, Shaw, Amad, de Ligt and Ugarte unresolved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19359,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[179,172],"tags":[1836,242,180],"class_list":["post-19360","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-manchester-united","category-epl","tag-2026-27-premier-league","tag-injury","tag-player-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19360","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19360"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19360\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19359"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19360"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19360"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19360"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}