He's Carrick, you knoww....

If this is Michael Carrick’s job interview for the full-time gig in the summer then there is a tick in every box so far.

Carrick, United’s dapper head coach with the Midas touch,  has got pretty much everything right so far. In winning a third successive game, he did in three matches what Ruben Amorim took 36 to manage.

At full-time after another nail-biting, harum scarum victory, Carrick was serenaded with his popular terrace chant: “He’s Carrick, you knowwwww, hard to believe he’s not Scholes.” Paul Scholes and Carrick formed the formidable fulcrum of United’s engine room for over a decade, with their fire-and-ice partnership driving the Reds to every major honour there is to win.

United manager Michael Carrick

Calming Carrick rolls back the years 

The two men’s contrasting styles dovetailed perfectly. Scholes was all action, often arriving in the box at the just right moment to smash in a scorcher before getting United moving again with a rapier-like pass or lung-busting run. Carrick, on the other hand, was the calming spoiler. Sitting in front of the back four, breaking up play and cutting out opposition attacks at source, subtly keeping United ticking and quietly dictating the tempo. Scholes was far more heralded and celebrated, yet Carrick arguably more influential.

If Scholes' fire and brimstone was the irresistible force, Carrick’s ice cool unflappability was the immovable object. It is this calm and unassuming temperament that has proved so invaluable in the early weeks of Carrick’s second coming. He doesn’t command an audience or court controversy. Not for him the emotional outburst or soporific soundbite. He is composed, sensible and measured but knows exactly what to say and when to say it. For those of us who remember Carrick’s safe hands on the tiller in his playing days, it is no surprise to see that taken from the pitch into the dugout.

Simplicity is everything

His quiet United renaissance has been nothing complicated. Rather like when he was at the peak of his considerable string-pulling powers in midfield, Carrick has kept things simple. But yet that is precisely what this squad needed after the confusion and chaos of the Amorim era.

The players never got to grips with what Amorim was trying to do -  or it never looked like it anyway. By simply giving players jobs they all understand, in their proper, natural positions, Carrick’s United look a team transformed. Kobbie Mainoo, whose ease on the ball and ability to cruise through games makes Amorim’s treatment of him look more baffling by the week, has been restored. So too has the back four of which the refusal to utilise proved a significant part of Amorim’s self-inflicted fate. Quite what the Portuguese coach makes of United’s sudden revival now he’s gone, I guess we will never know.

As the late, great Bill Shankly once said: “Football is a simple game made complicated by people who should know better.”

There is no magic formula, no tactical revolution, no blinding the players with science. He has brought clarity, simplicity and belief to a squad in need of direction. Maybe simply because he’s not Amorim, the players are buying into it and it’s working. This side’s togetherness, spirit and renewed belief in each other has been inspiring and uplifting – although the last two games haven’t been so kind on the ol’ ticker…
Carrick has gone back to basics but has taken risks too: bringing Benjamin Sesko on for Patrick Dorgu at Arsenal with United holding a slender lead. He could have introduced Mason Mount or Nouss Mazraoui but opted to bring on a striker. Whatever the Manchester United ‘DNA’ is (if, indeed it even exists), embracing risk and going for broke is part of it. 

Belief and hope spring eternal

Even by replacing Matheus Cunha with eventual matchwinner Sesko, Carrick’s simple switch was something his predecessor never would have done.

Carrick had to get all this right in the first instance and deserves huge credit for the job he has done so far. Of course, we all want the Manchester United manager to do well but surely Carrick’s emotional bond with us fans is helping him to succeed? Amorim never truly won over large sections of the fanbase and had no credit in the bank. 

Carrick has that connection after 18 trophies, 464 games and his first stint in the dugout (in which he beat Unai Emery and Mikel Arteta and drew with Thomas Tuchel). In those tense final moments against Fulham as Carrick orchestrated from the touchline, the backing was loud and unequivocal. He has struck a harmonious chord with fans and player and, to continue the musical analogy, now everyone is singing from the same hymnsheet. 

Carrick has brought United right back into contention for a place in the Champions League, and even as an outside bet for the league title. That scenario remains highly improbable and unlikely, but we were 12 points behind Newcastle at this stage in 1996. Stranger things have happened. Dare I start to dream? 

He’s Carrick, you knowwww, hard to believe he’s not Scholes!