Michael Carrick has delivered exactly what Man Utd wanted when they appointed him in January and he is now with a big chance of landing the job permanently.
06:00, 04 Mar 2026
Michael Carrick has beginning to sound like a long-term Manchester United head coach
If there is one word that is doing the rounds at Old Trafford at the moment that people are using to describe the last seven weeks, it is calm. For a club that usually looks addicted to chaos, it is an unusual sensation.
Michael Carrick celebrated 50 days in charge at Manchester United on Tuesday, and it’s hard to imagine how it could possibly have been better. Turning one point at West Ham into three almost feels like being greedy after the other six Premier League games ended in victories.
This is a year that started with open warfare at Carrington, as Ruben Amorim delivered some friendly fire towards the people who had employed him and backed him. In the space of one weekend, he engineered his own departure in a way that was shocking even for this club.
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Now, Jason Wilcox has gone from watching Amorim’s press conferences through his fingers to knowing full well that Carrick won’t be generating any unwanted headlines. He has been a safe pair of hands in just about every conceivable way.
In fact, the only headlines Carrick is now responsible for are those wondering when exactly he will get the job on a permanent basis. Sources at United are still insisting this will be a “thorough process”, but Carrick is smashing the audition.
That ‘thorough process’ hasn’t yet entailed talks with prospective bosses. It is at what you might call a preliminary stage. As with all modern clubs, United will be using the data to draw up a list of potential candidates, with that department now considerably more impressive since the appointment of Michael Sansoni as director of data.
Wilcox and chief executive Omar Berrada will be considering what kind of head coach they want, in terms of playing style and personality, as well as assessing how they might fit into the structure Ineos has created at Old Trafford.
But data points don’t get much more conclusive than 19 points from 21 games and auditions much more effective than Carrick’s. How will he fit in at United? Pretty smoothly, by the looks of it.
Carrick won the race to land the job on a temporary basis because United’s football executive liked the sense of calmness he brought to the process. He impressed Berrada and Wilcox in interviews, but without being overbearing.
They sensed the 44-year-old would bring a period of stability to that role, and that is exactly what has happened. It was telling that, during the period between Amorim’s sacking and Carrick’s appointment, the latter kept his counsel. While Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s name was in the headlines, Carrick stayed quiet, even going dark on WhatsApp groups with friends.
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The intrigue is just how desperate, or otherwise, he was for the job. Solskjaer had a sense of unfinished business at Old Trafford, but since his departure from Middlesbrough, Carrick had offered the impression of someone who wasn’t banging down doors to get back in.
He was in the frame for the Wolves job in November after Vitor Pereira’s departure, but didn’t seem particularly enthusiastic about the role, which eventually went to Rob Edwards. It left the feeling to some close to Carrick that maybe he saw his future going in a different direction.
But the clarion call from Old Trafford is altogether harder to ignore. He stepped into the role without hesitation, perhaps realising that this was a unique opportunity and one that wouldn’t be presented to a manager with his CV without that previous playing experience at United.
What Carrick’s success so far has done is put him in the frame for a Premier League job next season, whether that is at United or not. Even if the club opted to go in a different direction, he is unlikely to have to wait long before a call comes. He didn’t give the impression it was the United job or nothing this week.
When he was asked whether he saw his future in management rather than TV work, he joked to the inquisitor, “Why, was I not very good at that?”
For someone who seemed indifferent to coaching a few months ago, his love for being on the training pitch and working with players now comes through clearly. It sounds like a bug that would be hard to replace by sitting on a comfy chair in a TV studio and offering a few forthright opinions.
“I enjoy working with players. I enjoy trying to help players. The responsibility here is the whole football club, and I enjoy it,” he said.
“It’s a privilege to be able to influence certain things, but I enjoy working with players and helping them. Whether that’s their career, whether that’s for the team, whether that’s development week to week, it’s something I just really enjoy and am passionate about.
“I never really lost it, to be honest, whether it’s managing, head coach, whatever role that is, it comes down to working with players and people really to get the best out of people and backroom staff and supporters.”
That sounds like a job pitch and it was noticeable ahead of the trip to Newcastle that Carrick looked more confident, more assured in his press conference than he has done yet.
He joked with reporters about questions over whether he thinks he will get the job and whether he can catch Arsenal. He is looking and sounding more like a Manchester United head coach by the week.
Inside Old Trafford, there is no timeframe for making an appointment. It might make sense to wait until the season has finished, but that is not guaranteed. It could come sooner, but you sense that it depends on one man.
Carrick has certainly put himself front and centre of the debate. If the job was his to win 50 days ago, you could argue that it is his to lose now.
2026-03-04 06:00:00
