It really likely does, yeah.
Michael Carrick - Head Coach for the remainder of the season
- Thread starter Bastian
- Start date
I worry about this Steve Holland appointment. Who is he? Another journeyman, sniffing around succesful clubs and old teamates? I didn't rate Southgate, not at all. England had amazing players and we couldn't put five passes together at the last Euro's.
Just give us some more smiles and less embarrassing moments, Michael. Good luck, and prove the naysayers and the doubters wrong (myself included).
I like the guy, but we've essentially written off this season (again).
I'm glad he did. I'm fed up of hearing about philosophy. It's football.
He needs to shore up our defence, and he has no quality defensive CMs or CBs (bar maybe de Ligt) to do it. Welcome Michael!
Which isn't that bad. Even if he has a philosophy, he doesn't need to tell anything to the evil media. They are just waiting for him to fail, so that they can stick it in.
Amorim used to give 10 line answers for every question, detailing his thoughts, formation etc. It blew back brilliantly on him when we lost or struggled in the games. So better shut the mouth and not give anything to the media
I hope he does well. 4-2-3-1 really seems to fit this group of players. Sesko of top, Cunha, Mbeumo and Amad (he should be further up the pitch, maybe on the right). Bruno as a deep lying playmaker with Casemiro. Shaw, De Light, Heaven and Marouri (I don't want to see Dalot anymore. We also can push Bruno to take Cunha position and put Mainoo into Bruno's role. I think it offers a few variations if we need to chase a game or defend a lead. Martinez be a direct swap with Case. Hopefully he can provide some coaching to the team to undo some Amorim's traits like aggressive pressing.
I'd love to see us line up with Heaven and De Light as our CBs
It’s mad how lots of managers can have the same formation but get different results with players. Like fletch played a 4-2-3-1 and didn’t win a game. Carrick could play the same formation and win the first game. Obviously instructions and the way they’re being coached will play a part but surely a lot of it comes down to common sense on the pitch and the players making the correct choices.
Finally. Now get him a midfielder.
It's almost as if the formation isn't the only thing on the pitch that matters...
Yeah thats why its vital to look at performances over results for the short term, just to see how we are bedding in and whether we are unlucky in goals we concede.
I think Fletch set us out almost in Ole fashion, to just keep it simple and get bums off seats, he said himself he just had a conversation with players and gave general training, before telling the attackers to challenge themselves on finding a solution. This is probably why we saw Cunha just not be a LW on the 433 and cut into the middle where his muscle memory takes him.
Carrick I imagine will give more nuanced instructions because he has time to do so. He may instruct Cunha to stay wide, he may have rotations with Mbeumo and Bruno, he may drill better combinations, like overlaps between Dorgu/Cunha and Dalot/Mbeumo. These fine tunes to the system should put him in good stead, but I'd imagine they will take some time - at least time beyond the next two fixtures.
Highly unlikely
It honestly will be incredibly refreshing to see Carrick back at club. I really, really hope he does incredibly well. Seems to play attacking football, that’s all I can ask for. Play on the front foot and try to win every game. ETH left the club in such a mess, I always felt it would take at least 2-3 transfer windows to recover from that. So for me, if he gets the boys attacking and running, that’s all I can for. The results will be secondary.
Unless, of course, it’s Monty Python. Then the two combine very well
Can't remember being so underwhelmed by a managerial appointment. Even that first interview was underwhelming, and I like Carrick. Everything about this club is underwhelming nowadays.
Ah well. Back to square one. Or 46. I dunno, lost count. No faith anything will be different.
As depressing as it gets
Here's hoping for the best. 
I like Carrick a lot, wish him only the best, and I think of the candidates mooted for this interim position he's the best choice, but I think giving up on appointing a permanent manager with half a season left when we're sitting 6th in the table or whatever it is is fecking dumb. They'd better have something really special up their sleeves in the summer and whether Carrick does well or badly they'll potentially have questions on their hands before then e.g. does he need to go or should he be appointed permanently? All entirely avoidable by just going and doing their jobs and finding the best coach available now.
It's probably the case their real target won't be available until the summer.
Pretty sure Madrid are going for Makelele until the end of the season too. Big clubs just can't attract good managers these days. We'll just have to really think hard for six months before appointing whoever had a good end to the season or a good world cup.
Good luck to the man anyway, but it's very flat.
Good luck to the man anyway, but it's very flat.
Either way, there targets haven’t worked
Tuchel perhaps but if I were him I don't know why he'd give up the cushiest job in football unless he has a poor world cup, in which case do you even want him? And I can't believe he's so far and away the best man for the job that it will be worth waiting 6 months and potentially ruining our run for the European spots. I wouldn't mind Conte here if he wanted to come but again, is he worth waiting 6 months for? Not for me.
Guardiola is probably the only one I would wait 6 months for tbh. That would be hilarious.
Ok, I’ll play, name me 5 incredible players who’ve went on to become top class directors of football.
There’s also countless managers who’ve went on to become far better than they were as players. Whether you like him or not, calling him a shite player isn’t how go judge him. He actually wasn’t a shite player either as if it matters.
I'm pretty surprised by the volume of negative reaction to Carrick getting the position. What did people expect would happen midseason?
I thought Carrick as a caretaker would be the sensible option from the start of the season when it became apparent that Amorim (Grimsby) was an emotional wreck on top of only having a single football idea. This buys the club time to seek out the most desired target.
The important thing now is for the hierarchy to actually have a coherent vision and employ a head coach that fits with that vision, rather than making it up as they go along, which, let's be honest, is 100% what they have done. This is where I hope journalists start turning the screws and seek out the City boys to hold them to account.
I somehow get the feeling that if Berrada was asked on live TV what the footballing vision is for the club he'd flunk the test, but that guy actually chose the last manager, and Wilcox - a technical director quickly promoted to DoF, while he describes himself as a coach - is likely here at Berrada's request.
If they are to be leading the club going forward and if they want to be trusted by the supporters with the decisions they are to make, they will surely have to break their silence. I don't trust that the hierarchy know what they're doing.
I thought Carrick as a caretaker would be the sensible option from the start of the season when it became apparent that Amorim (Grimsby) was an emotional wreck on top of only having a single football idea. This buys the club time to seek out the most desired target.
The important thing now is for the hierarchy to actually have a coherent vision and employ a head coach that fits with that vision, rather than making it up as they go along, which, let's be honest, is 100% what they have done. This is where I hope journalists start turning the screws and seek out the City boys to hold them to account.
I somehow get the feeling that if Berrada was asked on live TV what the footballing vision is for the club he'd flunk the test, but that guy actually chose the last manager, and Wilcox - a technical director quickly promoted to DoF, while he describes himself as a coach - is likely here at Berrada's request.
If they are to be leading the club going forward and if they want to be trusted by the supporters with the decisions they are to make, they will surely have to break their silence. I don't trust that the hierarchy know what they're doing.
We’re 2 points off 4th.
We surely will be able to find one on his last leg or someone who will be injured for the majority of the season.
As long as he doesn’t run our players to the ground with complicated and physically unrealistic tactics, I think we will do just fine.
What the feck do you expect him to say before he even takes a training session? Yeah they’re all fecking shite. Guaranteed morale booster that.
Yes he should have called them rubbish before he’s walked into the dressing room . Some awful posting been done the last few weeks
Welcome back Mike, loved him as a player, as I did Ole.
Hope I'm wrong but I suspect its going to be a shit show.
Thankfully, we have football people in charge now, so I'm sure they've a plan.
Hope I'm wrong but I suspect its going to be a shit show.
Thankfully, we have football people in charge now, so I'm sure they've a plan.
Well we nearly signed Kroos but we know how that turned out. Seems like our transfer strategy isn’t as good.
How come Carrick wasn’t favoured for England national side? Genuine question?
Similar reason Scholes wasn't. Englands view of the game was dinosaur and didn't really appreciate the true value a Carrick or Scholes can bring to a team.
Sven, McLaren, capello, hodgson and allardyce.
Are you really surprised when you list out those managers?
Fletcher's approach wasn't like Ole's in most ways, it was much more expansive (and naïve) and left huge gaps between midfield and defence, and in wide areas. The closest Ole came to that was during his interim period, but it didn't take long for him to adopt a mid block as the base to build on. I see your point about the "vibes" based management though, letting the players freestyle it rather than any planned patterns or overloads, there's some similarity there.
As for Carrick, he's in a really tough position. He needs to try to find a way to make us solid, despite us not having the players to take a proactive approach to games without being punished in transition, with our weaknesses in midfield and at fullback. The most effective setup for us would be a mid/low block to make us more difficult to score against, but if he takes that approach questions will be asked about why we didn't go with Ole, who's used that approach at a high level here previously.
It'll be interesting to see what he does, we just have to hope that, despite the PR and optimistic interview comments, he recognises the limitations of this squad and sets us up to mitigate those weaknesses. With City and Arsenal to start him off, things could get very pessimistic very quickly if he doesn't.
While I can’t answer whether Carrick has a philosophy or not, I can say he took the right approach to answer it by evading it. This is interim few month period. Not a rebuilding long term job that you need to instill a certain style while disregard result.
Unlike with Rangnick who was contracted with a promise of advisor role afterward, its not Carrick job give open heart surgery assessment of the players and the squad. Rangnick used his philosophy and methods to assess players suitability. But Carrick goal is to try to save our season. He can change game to game with different formations 4-3-3, 4-4-2, 5-2-3, 5-4-1… with different styles: playing on counter, or simply playing for a draw parking the bus… it’s acceptable. the squad is not his player. He knows some of the players but most of them are new to him. he hasn’t worked with them yet. Talking about philosophy only creates more questions about who fits this and who don’t.
Because only prayer can work for us now?