Michael Carrick's Manchester United Rebuild: Key Decisions Ahead
Michael Carrick has been handed the keys to Manchester United’s future. Champions League qualification earned him a two-year deal and shifted him from stop-gap to standard-bearer. Now the club trusts him with the kind of recruitment calls that will define this new era at Old Trafford.
The first big decision came in midfield. Casemiro, the veteran Brazil international, has gone, leaving a sizeable hole in the centre of the pitch. United moved quickly. Andrey Santos arrived. Youri Tielemans followed. Both have been heavily involved in pre-season, both already look like central pieces in Carrick’s remodelled engine room.
Up front, the picture is less complete. Benjamin Sesko stands as the only orthodox No.9 in the squad. Marcus Rashford, fresh from a productive loan spell at Barcelona, is being eased back into the setup, but he is not a classic penalty-box striker. Talk has persisted around the need for another forward, another focal point, another option for a long season that will stretch across domestic and European fronts.
And then there is the left side of defence – the position Patrice Evra once owned. United continue to scan the market, and one name, Hall, has drawn attention as a potential long-term answer at left-back. The temptation, as always at this club, is to find “the next” somebody. The next icon. The next Evra.
Evra wants no part of that conversation.
Speaking to GOAL, in association with Stake, the former United defender warned against lazy comparisons and the rush to crown successors.
“You have to be careful,” he said. “With [Tyrell] Malacia, people wanted to say straight away, ‘this is the new Patrice Evra’. I say for all due respect, when you play for United, it's different. The jersey is really heavy.”
Evra pointed to Luke Shaw as the clearest example of how brutal that weight can be. “Luke Shaw could have been the one, but unfortunately he had that bad injury when he broke his tibia,” Evra said. “And to recover from that, I think what he's doing is amazing. He can perform in a World Cup because it's just three months and people couldn't understand why for the English national team he's performing so well.
“But it's tough. And I had a talk with Luke, it was like maybe five years ago. And you know, when you have that kind of injury, you don't want to go 100% in the challenge again because you still have some trauma.”
That is the backdrop to any move for a new left-back. Talent is not enough. “So that's why we need someone to come,” Evra continued. “Hall is a good left back. But like I say, I don't like to be carried away. Malacia was ‘the new Patrice Evra’.”
He admitted even he was briefly drawn in. “Even myself, I was looking and saying wow. Then after one injury or whatever, something happened. When you want to be the new Patrice Evra, you need to play nine years consistently. You need to play even more than the goalkeeper. It will be your first challenge when people want to compare players with myself.”
Nine years. Relentless availability. Relentless standards. That is the bar Evra sets, and it is the bar any new left-back will be measured against, whether he wants it or not.
“Then after, of course, you need to be good defensively and offensively,” Evra said. “So what Hall is doing with his club right now? Yes, but I always say when you play for another club, when you do a good game, people will say it was an amazing game. And when you play for United, a good game is normal. A super game when you play at your best, they will say it's normal.
“When you play a normal game, they're going to say it's a bad game. When you play a bad game, they're going to say this was the worst game of his life. Are you ready to accept those kinds of critics? That's what we have to ask him.”
Carrick’s rebuild is already taking shape in midfield and in attack. The next signing at left-back will not just be judged on his crossing or his recovery pace. At Old Trafford, as Evra reminds everyone, the real question is simpler and far harsher: can you live with the shirt when it starts to weigh heavy?
