Michael Carrick Addresses Soft Landing Claims for Manchester United

Michael Carrick has dismissed talk that Manchester United have been handed a soft landing to the new Premier League season, branding the suggestion “ridiculous”.

United open their campaign on Saturday away to Hull, promoted via the Championship play-offs, before hosting Ipswich at Old Trafford on 30 August, another side fresh from the second tier. The fixture list has prompted claims that Carrick’s team should start fast and ride the momentum of last season’s third-place finish, which secured him the job on a permanent basis.

Carrick wanted no part of that narrative.

“A newly promoted team away from home is a tough game,” he said, stressing the reality behind the romanticism of opening-day optimism. He pointed to his own experience of those occasions, when promoted sides play with energy, emotion and nothing to lose.

“I've been involved in them in the past so I'm fully aware of what's coming at us on Saturday and what we've got to be ready for.

“It's not favourable. It's an easy thing to throw out there but it's pretty ridiculous. I'm not taking it that way at all.”

United arrive with expectations heavy on their shoulders after last season’s surge, but Carrick is clearly determined to keep the focus on the grind rather than the gloss of a supposedly gentle start. Hull away, Ipswich at home: on paper, it looks inviting. On the pitch, Carrick is treating it as an early examination of whether his side can handle the weight of being hunted from day one.