If you hire a guy as interim you're explicitly saying that your assessment is that he isn't good enough to be a permanent manager. Under normal circumstances, no one hires an interim manager. It's a made up thing that clubs do only when they have to get rid of someone and they can't figure out who the next guy should be.

The problem is that clubs, and specifically United, confuse short term success as proof that their initial assessment was wrong. Carrick's managerial flaws didn't disappear just because he had 4-5 months of good results.

A long term interim manager (i.e. more than 1-2 games) is a tool that clubs use when they don't have a plan and don't know what they want to do. Well run clubs don't do interim managers because they have a succession plan or a list of candidates they are confident in should it all go wrong with the current guy. United only gave Carrick a 2 year contract which implies that they were hedging their bets at least a little. Then they should already have a list in the safe of potential candidates to go after in case of emergency. But I doubt they do.

But they didn't say that. They never said he had no chance at being manager. They left it open ended. In fact they literally said "we will decide at the end of the season".

If they wanted a caretaker they had one for 2 games before deciding Carrick was the step up from caretaker. AKA interim.

Ok maybe we're saying the same thing or getting lost in semantics. But I'll just say that the right way to do it is to fire a guy and then hire the next permanent guy on a multi year contract almost immediately. Maybe you have an in between guy for 1-2 games while you sign the contract or whatnot but that's it. Not this United method where you don't know what to do so you call up a guy for a couple games or even months and then you may or may not decide to keep him permanently.

Heck, Carrick was interim once before. And even then there were people like "should we keep him around longer" after 2 games. He eventually took himself out of the equation but I'm convinced they would have kept him around then if he hadn't.

That I would agree with. But they had no list. And then Carrick went and won a lot of games and tied their hands.

But at least we have scored goals. More than Spurs and de Zerbi can say. Thats a very expensive clown show right now.

Looks like I missed nothing.

Well, we pretty much know who we probably would have gotten if we didn't get Carrick; it probably would have been Iraola. (Liverpool did that will they / won't they thing with sacking Slot, and it seemed like the club was looking at him before going with Carrick).

I'm not super-happy with the result since I quit watching. But the hyperbole is a little excessive since we have been de-prioritizing the domestic cups under Ineos. But, Brighton plays a lot of their squad players, too, and they won. And it would be kind of nice to win a round before getting bounced. And we aren't exactly doing great in the ones we do care about to start the season.

I would agree it's hyperbole if you take the game in isolation. Losing after leading 2-0 at home isn't a good look in any circumstance but if United had 10 league points and were playing well, it would be easy to move on.

But they have 4 points and haven't really looked good in any of them except for maybe 30 minutes at Ipswich. Everything else has been average at best and in some cases….bad…with little appreciable gain in quality.

I'm not going to call for his head or get myself worked up if United keep him for the next several months. I fully expect them to actually in most realistic scenarios. But I also think it's clear that he's not the right person for the job. Maybe he loves me wrong. I hope so actually. But I doubt it.

I think it would take being bottom half for them to sack him mid-season; like a Spurs-type year (or last year of ten Hag). We weren't going to sack Amorim before he basically decided he would start using his press conferences to sack himself. I also don't think they care about what people are saying on social media or YouTube (let alone an American college fan site lol). I mean, they barely react to stuff our club legends say on stuff like the Overlap and Sky lol. So I don't think anyone needs to self-censor, it literally doesn't matter.

Although, it is weird in that, like, American sports fans pretty much know we can't affect our owners. People have opinions, but you don't really have many people thinking fan consensus can turn into the organization's decision. Like when the Mavs traded Luka Doncic… fans hated it vociferously, but fan opinion didn't matter (to take one example where there was near consensus). I don't know if it's because fans in Germany and Spain actually have a say in the selection of who runs the clubs, but there is this seemingly underlying belief for English clubs that if the fans really really really want a thing, it can happen (despite the fact that the fans obviously really really really overwhelmingly want the Glazers gone, and that hasn't progressed much). Just kind of an odd difference in fandoms.

I guess the counter-example would be when A&M was supposedly going to hire Mark Stoops and fan backlash supposedly turned it around. But I think it's different because political appointees ultimately run the University.

And I would also say this: if we don't win Sunday, I don't think anything would immediately happen, BUT….

Talk about a very long and very noisy international break…. I mean, Wow.

I think if they believe the top 5 is getting too close to unrealistic, then they'll make the move. Especially because there are better candidates available now than last year when Amorim was struggling. Howe and Nagelsmann have their warts to be sure but they are much more reasonable, unemployed candidates than anyone else last time we did this.

Hey, at least we may not have the worst loss to Brighton this week….

Their xG is low as they've scored two from long range but they've also created at least 3-4 almost big chances where only a last ditch tackle in the box stopped a certain goal. Their press is really really good.

On target xG is 1.61 to .51, though. I think it would be hard to argue that they shouldn't be ahead. Maybe by not as much as they are, but that's true of most whippings.

For sure, they deserve to be ahead.

Also… we are guaranteed to not be the Big Six team in the worst position going into the International Break.

3 times in 20' we have played out of the back and either given it up badly or almost given it up badly. Sooner or later this is going to cost a goal.

Well they are sure getting opportunities…

Lammens had stood in his head so far.

With no Sesko today I might flip Cunha and Rashford. Rashford running on from the left isn't doing anything and Cunha isn't a 9 or false 9. He's better wide left.

It can't be any worse than this. Right now neither are giving you anything from where they are.

Rashford puts the easy sitter from 8 yards out and in open space into row Q. Thats a bad miss.

We're so easy to attack. Our FBs always play high in defense. All Fulham has to do is play it behind them. Neither of our CBs are fast enough to get to the ball before the attacker so inevitably, they get pulled wide having to defend 1x1 and leaving an acre of space between the CBs. Then someone else makes a run into that acre and voila, you have a dangerous shooting opportunity or potential to make a second pass for an even more dangerous shooting opportunity.

Baleba better be the love child of prime Casemiro and prime Kante or else that tactic will never work with this roster. Impossible to ask someone to cover that much space

Can we trade for Oscar Bobb? I just want to have a guy with 2 first names on the squad.

And for real, do you suppose Fulham would trade Shaw for Jedi straight up?

Sigh

Another two months of this before United even start thinking of finding a new manager.

I don't particularly blame the manager; own goal aside, who has really done much of anything good? I guess I could complain about not subbing quicker.

That was a true OG. It wasn't one of those deflections. He literally played it into his own goal.

And it came from bad play out of the back. Can't say I didn't predict that was coming.

It's all too slow. Just get men behind the ball and United have no idea how to create danger. It's either a shot from distance or they eventually give the ball away.

That's at least partially on the manager.

To clarify… it was bad. But other than Lammens, this has been an annoyingly tepid performance across the board. Like frustratingly so. And you don't feel a whole lot of urgency which is surprising.

I guess I just wish we'd sub and see if anyone on the bench cares a little bit.

Rashford looks like he did 2 plus seasons ago. His best asset was his raw speed on the wing and he's lost a step.

Both wings in him and Mbeuno are slower than the defenders they are matched up with so any wing play bogs down.

Yeah, I don't need an app to know we lost the running battle.

Claw back a point maybe

Haha

No stoppage in 1H and +3 here in 2H. Not sure I have ever seen so little given.