Michael Carrick: Recent poor form is ‘not the end of the world’ for Man Utd

Manchester United manager Michael Carrick has called for perspective after back-to-back defeats have put him under pressure just weeks into the season.

Days after a controversial 1-0 home defeat to rivals Manchester City, United blew a 2-0 lead to exit the Carabao Cup with a 3-2 loss to Brighton at Old Trafford, with the Stretford End venting its fury as Carrick and his players trudged off.

With four points from their opening four Premier League matches, United need to pick up a win from Sunday’s trip to Fulham or face what will feel like a very long international break – and an all-too-familiar feeling that a season could be getting away from them already.

“It’s not a catastrophe or a disaster,” said Carrick. “It’s not the end of the world. We’re not in the place where we’ve gone on an awful long run of horrific results, you know?

“We’ve lost a couple of games recently and we feel like we’ve started and we’ve been in all the games that we’ve played, if not been the better team at the start of games, so it’s not like we’re having a real struggle all the time.

“We’ve done a lot of good things in them to put ourselves in really good positions in the games we’ve been in, so the belief certainly comes from that.

“Of the good things that we’ve done, that gets totally lost in some ways in the surrounding feeling, but it doesn’t get lost by us.”

Carrick won 12 of his 17 games in charge last season, but already this campaign they have lost to newly promoted Hull, been pegged back twice in a 2-2 draw at Everton, and fallen to a City side who had Phil Foden sent off in the 23rd minute last weekend.

Wednesday’s defeat was the first time United had lost at home having led 2-0 since 1976.

“History tells you that any team that’s successful goes through periods when you have to come through it and improve,” Carrick added. “We’ve had a small period when it hasn’t been exactly what we want it to be.

“I was expecting a point when we would go through it, it was going to come. There was going to be a time when you don’t get everything out of it that you want. It’s how you work through it, how you react, keep doing the right things and believe you will come through it.”

Since taking the job last January, Carrick has exuded calm and this week he has insisted the pressure is not something that affects him.

Asked if the X-rated chants coming from the Stretford End on Wednesday night hurt on a personal level, Carrick said: “We don’t like losing matches. It’s not like I don’t feel the emotion, but it doesn’t affect what we do next.”

Bookies have made their views clear by slashing the odds on Carrick losing his job before Christmas, but the 45-year-old insisted that would never cross his mind.

“In terms of the future and the (club) ownership and how long I’ve got, it’s ridiculous to think that way in the position I’m in,” he said. “It’s just not on the radar.”