Man United never learn their lessons - this Michael Carrick situation is Sol so predictable...

It's becoming an almost yearly event. A Manchester United manager once hailed as the bright new hope and tasked with steering the ailing Old Trafford ghost ship back on course suddenly finds himself staring grimly out to sea as the chronically tired vessel slowly begins to groan and creak once again, before plummeting fully back into the murky depths. The driving rain that provided the backdrop to the Red Devils' tepid 4-1 Champions League collapse in Como on Wednesday night certainly had an air of pathetic fallacy to it, as Michael Carrick's beleagured side find themselves increasingly caught up in a storm of their own making. The list of captains who have already been thrown overboard is long & possibly growing if things aren't turned around very quickly. And, of course, there's the small matter of a mutiny...

The most striking aspect of the sorry predicament that Man United currently find themselves in is not its surprise factor, that disappeared around a decade ago, but the sheer familiarity of it. A club that once seemed the bastion of managerial stability and playing power has been allowed to gradually descend into a permanent state of chaotic flux. One crisis seems to blend into another as managers and players are brought in and discarded like dirty dishcloths, with every 'fresh start', 'statement' derby victory and 'promising' cup run more than balanced out by a 'concerning' dip in form, unexpected humbling to a respective minnow and the inevitable knee-jerk jettisoning of whoever seems most responsible at the time. The pattern is becoming almost reliable enough to set a watch to - Sky Sports News must have a full 'Man United Crisis' broadcast template ready to run on an annual basis nowadays. Michael Carrick and his charges are simply the latest victims of this conveyer belt of bewilderment.

Of course, it takes little understanding of club football to get an idea of who or what set the wheels of this chaotic chain into motion. Ever since the Glazer family rode into Old Trafford in 2005, followed latterly by minority shareholder Sir Jim Ratcliffe in 2024, the club has been run as much as a profit generating cash cow as a sporting institution. It's to the immense credit of managerial legend Sir Alex Ferguson that he was able to fulfil the footballing side of the operation for 8 years following the American takeover, with a further 5 Premier League titles & a Champions League crown added to his earlier successes before retiring in 2013, but since the Scot's departure things really have unravelled badly. United's misteps since have been plentiful, wide-ranging & well documented, not least so an erratic, scattergun approach to hiring managers. This time around, though, they seem to have repeated a mistake that appeared glaringly obvious the first time around...

A miserable 3-1 defeat at Anfield in December 2018 saw Jose Mourinho's 2 and a half year reign at Old Trafford come to an abrupt end. With the 'International Coaching Icon' experiment deemed to have failed with Mourinho, as with Louis Van Gaal before him, United turned to feel-good Ferguson-era nostalgia to provide a brief uplift in the form of former striker & hero of the club's 1999 treble Ole Gunnar Solskjaer, hired on an interim basis until the conclusion of the 2018-19 campaign. It seemed almost too simple a strategy to work, but the Norwegian's appointment did indeed inspire an initial improvement in results. The Red Devils went unbeaten in Solskjaer's first 12 league fixtures at the wheel, winning 10 and maintaining steady progress in cup competitions. Excitement then reached fever pitch in March 2019 when a 2-0 deficit to Paris St Germain in the Last 16 of the Champions League was overturned following an unlikely 3-1 away victory in the return leg. Solskjaer was appointed as full time coach later the same month. And that was about as good as it got...

Subsequent eliminations to Wolves & Barcelona in the quarter finals of the FA Cup & Champions League respectively were complemented by a concerning run of just 1 win & 4 defeats in the club's final 7 league games of the season. In fairness, the following 2 campaigns did demonstrate promise as Solskjaer led the Red Devils to 3rd & 2nd place finishes, but an inconsistent team rarely threatened to resemble serial silverware challengers and suffered several embarrasing results (a 1-6 home hammering by Jose Mourinho's Spurs in October 2020 perhaps the nadir). Things then completely fell apart towards the beginning of the 2021-22 season, a horrendous run from September to November bringing 5 defeats and 17 goals conceded in 7 league games, including a 4-2 loss at Leicester City, a 0-5 lashing by Liverpool at Old Trafford and a 4-1 humbling by Watford. That Vicarage Road horror show saw the curtain finally fall on Solskjaer, who departed after just under 2 years in charge having promised much but delivered nothing in the way of cold, hard trophies.

It's not quite 'for 2018-19 read 2025-26', but the similarities between Solskjaer's ill-fated reign & Carrick's recent spell are there for all to see. A midfield general integral to the success of Ferguson's late 2000's & early 2010's sides, Carrick found himself returning to Old Trafford on an interim basis for a second time (having ironically stood in for 3 games following Solskjaer's dismissal in 2021) after the departure of Ruben Amorim in January 2026. Things got off to the best possible start, with a 2-0 derby victory over Manchester City preceding a 3-2 success away at eventual champions Arsenal. 10 wins and just 2 defeats in 15 league games followed, seeing United finish 3rd, launching a wave of Old Trafford positivity and landing Carrick the permanent job over the summer. Sound familiar?

The United faithful would be delighted if the parallels ended there, which sadly hasn't been the case... A 2-0 mauling by Hull City's newly promoted Tigers on the opening day of this campaign could perhaps have been written off as a blip following a 5-2 success over fellow newcomers Ipswich Town in United's first home game. That trouncing of the Tractor Boys is as good as United have been since, however, embarking on a 5 game winless run in the league, being dumped out of the League Cup despite taking a 2-0 lead at home to Brighton and losing two of their opening three Champions League games. Those two European matches will be of particular concern, not least after an outburst from defender Lisandro Martinez had to be contained following the first defeat, 2-0 at Atletico Madrid last week, only for captain Bruno Fernandes to directly criticise the coaching staff for their tactics during Wednesday's Como debacle. It all points to an unhappy camp, and once again, the 'former player as manager' dream appears to be falling apart at Old Trafford.

The club's growing obsession with former players of Ferguson's glory days returning as coaches, as if their mere presence and 'knowing the club' alone is somehow going to lead to the re-emergence of a rose-tinted golden era, is a huge problem in itself. But it taps into a wider issue at United. There seems to be a complete lack of understanding at the top as to how a club of United's undoubted size & global stature sustains success, or what got them to this level in the first place. Ferguson himself, it's easy to forget, failed to win a trophy during his first 3 full seasons. A famous Mark Robins winner at Nottingham Forest on the road to 1990 FA Cup glory has famously gone down as the goal that saved the Glaswegian's job and laid the foundations for over two trophy laden decades. Had a young Ferguson stepped into the Old Trafford dugout of 2026, rather than 1986, would he be afforded as much time? It's extremely doubtful at best...

Some may point to the pressures of the modern game and the need for instant success. All well and good until you consider that United have been overtaken in recent years by two of their greatest rivals who stuck by promising young coaches for years before enjoying the fruits of their labours - Jurgen Klopp took 4 years to claim a trophy at Liverpool before the floodgates opened, whilst a sole FA Cup success was the only silverware Mikel Arteta had to show for 6 years of impressive work at Arsenal before last season's title glory. Old principles can still pave the way to glorious new eras in modern football, but United's current ownership seem to have eschewed values such as patience and trust in favour of the naive belief that the club has simply always been massive and will one day return to their natural place at the top of the pecking order. Lets not forget, this is a club that without Ferguson has failed to win a League or European Cup since 1968...

Of course, hiring the Scot's former charges for a potent nostalgia hit hasn't been the United hierarchy's only managerial recruitment tactic of recent times. In fact, since the day Ferguson stepped out of the door, United's sense of direction as a club has resembled that of a blindfolded squirrel on caffeine. The shrewd, wily operator David Moyes, supposedly Ferguson's own choice as replacement and very much of a similar managerial mould, wasn't given the grace of a full campaign to prove himself before his hierachy lost patience. Since then, the club's appointments have covered more or less all extremes - from European coaching heavyweights (Van Gaal, Mourinho, Ragnick) to young up-and-coming continental faces (Ten-Hag, Amorim), to the aforementioned former player route (Solskjaer, Carrick). None have delivered sustained success, but again, have any of them really been offered the time or support to do so?

It all screams of a club in love with its own importance but with no serious understanding of how it actually became successful, how to sustain that success, or where to look when it starts to disappear. Perhaps the owners lack of connection to the local area, or even British football in general, doesn't help, but then American ownership has thrived at the likes of Anfield and the Emirates in recent years through smart business models, shrewd recruitment across all areas and, of course, patience and consistency. United's idea of consistency appears to be how many consecutive seasons they can turn a profit in the club store or increase their global TikTok following.

Carrick, of course, is still in the dugout, and fighting to stay there. As admirable and determined a figure in his current role as he was on the pitch, his current predicament isn't to be envied and is merely a symptom of the myriad of issues transpiring above him. But if he is to ultimately leave following this latest malaise, what next? Frankly, who knows. Again, the former player route is there for United if the likes of Darren Fletcher want a sip of the poisoned chalice. A few European household names such as Julien Nagelsmann or Antonio Conte may still be attracted to the role, although it's surely becoming a harder sell by the year. Some lesser known names may also yet come to the fore. But if United really do want to turn the clock back in a positive, progressive and future focused fashion, consider Eddie Howe. Young British coach with a proven track record of pulling up trees with unfancied clubs, moulding attractive, effective teams in his own image and arousing sleeping giants further north than Manchester. Sound familiar, Fergie fans?