Dimitar Berbatov offered a stark assessment after seeing Manchester United in 18th place, saying his former club \u201cdeserve to be there.\u201d<\/p>\n
United\u2019s poor start to the 2026\/27 Premier League season has left them in the bottom three after one win from their opening nine matches. By Saturday, Nov. 7, the club were inside the relegation zone, marking the first time the record English champions have been in that position at this stage of a top-flight campaign since 1986.<\/p>\n
Berbatov, who spent four seasons at Old Trafford, represented a very different era. The Bulgarian striker never finished lower than second with United, won two league titles and reached two Champions League finals. Faced with the scale of the club\u2019s current decline, the beIN Sports pundit reacted by covering his eyes before giving his blunt view.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe way that United are playing sometimes, they deserve to be there, honestly,\u201d Berbatov said.<\/p>\n
The pressure is also on Michael Carrick, whose future remains uncertain after overseeing this alarming start. Even after the Champions League win over Roma in midweek, Carrick said he still had not been told whether he would remain in charge after the November international break, which begins once United\u2019s Premier League match with Aston Villa on Sunday is complete.<\/p>\n
Asked whether he had received any fresh clarity on his position, Carrick replied: \u201cNo.\u201d<\/p>\n
He added: \u201cJust carry on as absolute normal,\u201d and continued: \u201cWhatever is going to happen is going to happen.\u201d<\/p>\n
Attention now turns to Villa, managed by Unai Emery, the coach many would like to see in the Old Trafford dugout. That looks unlikely for now, with Villa working to secure their manager on an even longer and more lucrative contract. Still, the meeting provides another pointed test for Carrick at a moment when the scrutiny around United has only intensified.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Berbatov gave a blunt verdict as United\u2019s poor start left them in the relegation zone after nine matches.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22285,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[711,179],"tags":[1836,1047,59],"class_list":["post-22286","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-aston-villa","category-manchester-united","tag-2026-27-premier-league","tag-champions-league","tag-featured"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22286","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=22286"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22286\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22285"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22286"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22286"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22286"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}