Michael Carrick\u2019s position at Manchester United remains unsettled, with uncertainty surrounding both his immediate future and the club\u2019s next step. Gary Neville described his former teammate as \u201ca dead man walking\u201d after the 3-0 defeat to Bournemouth, and reports suggested United were already identifying possible replacements. Yet by Monday morning, Carrick was still carrying out his duties as usual.<\/p>\n
According to the Daily Mail, he was at the training ground to watch a behind-closed-doors U-21 friendly with Hull City. It is still not clear whether he will lead the first-team session on Tuesday, or whether he will still be in charge for Saturday\u2019s Premier League meeting with Chelsea. That uncertainty reflects the broader confusion around the situation.<\/p>\n
While Carrick watched young players such as Shea Lacey, Tyler Fletcher and Harry Amass, The Athletic reported that \u201ccrunch talks\u201d were taking place among the key decision-makers. Those involved were thought to include minority co-owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe, majority shareholders Joel and Avram Glazer, chief executive Omar Berrada and sporting director Jason Wilcox.<\/p>\n
United supporters made their feelings clear on Sunday. The manager was warmly received, while the players and club executives were met with fierce criticism from the stands. Carrick, however, cannot be blamed for the 13 years of poor results since Sir Alex Ferguson departed. As Ratcliffe said in 2024: \u201cThere have been a whole series of coaches, some of which were very good. And none of them were successful, or survived for very long. The only conclusion you can draw is that the environment in which they were \u00adworking didn\u2019t work.\u201d<\/p>\n
That environment still appears deeply flawed, but changing one manager is easier than overhauling the wider structure. Even so, deciding who should come next has not been straightforward. Wilcox is believed to prefer former Newcastle United manager Eddie Howe, while Christopher Vivell is reported to favour Julian Nagelsmann. Antonio Conte has also been linked, with BBC Sport saying the Italian would be \u201ckeen\u201d on the role.<\/p>\n
Financial considerations may also be slowing the process. The Athletic reported \u201clingering suspicions\u201d that cost is part of the delay. Carrick is four months into a two-year deal, and any severance would be \u201cconsiderable.\u201d Hiring a replacement would also bring extra expense, with The Guardian stating that Howe\u2019s appointment would cost around \u00a33 million ($4 million), plus the cost of bringing his staff with him.<\/p>\n
For now, there are \u201cno guarantees\u201d Carrick will be in place for Chelsea. The fixture matters both immediately and longer term, with United needing Champions League qualification to give any future manager meaningful backing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Carrick\u2019s future is unclear as United weigh managerial options, finances and the Chelsea fixture.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22086,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[179,2019],"tags":[1836,1047],"class_list":["post-22087","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-manchester-united","category-manchester-united-news","tag-2026-27-premier-league","tag-champions-league"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22087","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=22087"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22087\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22086"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22087"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22087"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22087"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}