ELLAND ROAD is a scary place to go at the best of times and Michael Carrick needs his players to stand up for him on Sunday.
Leeds away is the sort of game where you need people like , some strong characters.
You can’t have people go hiding.
It would have been tough for in any event but it’s been made even harder after the whole when they lost 2-0 to Atletico Madrid.
Maybe you don’t want a player saying that in public but I’m sure a lot of fans think he was telling the sort of truth the club doesn’t want to hear.
What was saying was basically, ‘You can keep blaming the manager but unfortunately we’ve got a team here that’s not good enough to be doing any better than what we’re doing. This is what we are’.
And that is what they are, .
We always think of them as a club that had great teams. I go back to the Matt Busby days, then came along and they produced some incredible teams.
The kids came out of the youth team and Fergie made great signings like , Jaap Stam, Nemanja Vidic, Rio Ferdinand, Andy Cole and Dwight Yorke.
And , too, of course.
But Alex admits his last side, the one that , was probably the worst team he’d had — getting older, needing rebuilding.
Since then, nobody has been able to make a success of it.
I’ve known Michael since he was 12 years old at .
When I went to Portsmouth, I wanted to sign him. We even had a deal for £2.5million and he was coming down for a medical. But he got a phone call from Tottenham and so we lost him.
When I went to Spurs, said he knew he had to be a player as I wanted to sign him having worked with him before - because only an idiot signs someone he knows is no good.
Daniel took a gamble and it paid off, even though Jacques Santini, who was the manager at the time, didn’t know who he was and didn’t play him.
I can’t say I always saw a manager in him.
Michael’s always been a lovely guy from a lovely family, a really intelligent footballer who knew the game, read it, controlled matches. But he’s always been a quiet lad, too, laid-back. It’s what he is.
When United the other day, he wasn’t running up and down the touchline — the complete opposite to Roberto De Zerbi, kissing the ball and all that when they equalised.
Results haven’t been great but I hope he turns it around and keeps the job because I love him.
I know that some of the fans want the United manager to be a bigger character. I get that.
Michael is a bit more like Ole Gunnar Solskjaer or Ralf Rangnick. But they’ve had Louis van Gaal and as well, big personalities, and it’s just not worked.
Everybody since Fergie’s tried it and we’re not talking mugs here. They’ve had great managers but none have been able to even look like winning a title.
And whoever comes in next, it’s still a massive rebuilding job to do.
In terms of recruitment, they’re short. Recruitment, recruitment, recruitment, that is the problem.
The players that are there are not good enough to take them where they want to go, they’ve not got a team that is good enough to be challenging Arsenal and .
You can change Michael tomorrow and they are still not going to finish any higher than fifth or sixth this season. That’s how I see their team.
They’re nowhere near good enough to challenge for a title.
That’s what Michael is dealing with. And it would be the same for anyone else, whoever they bring in.
