Michael Carrick defended Manchester United’s underwhelming 2-2 start to the Premier League season against Everton on Sunday, despite conceding two late goals to squander a win.
United started promisingly against new entrants Hull and Ipswich before the Everton fixture but has only managed four points from its first three games of the season. Carrick was quick to play down any early alarm bells.
“It’s not that bad,” he said. “We’ve got that close to coming away with three points today, that’s football, there are moments we can deal with a bit better, but we’ll be fine.”
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Bryan Mbeumo opened the scoring inside the first minute of the second half and Benjamin Sesko restored the visitors’ lead in the 88th minute.
However, United failed to hold out as blistering strikes by Tyrique George and Ainsley Maitland-Niles secured a point for an Everton side short on attacking options.
“Obviously we can’t ignore it,” added Carrick. “We need to concede less goals to give us a better chance of winning games, but we’ll certainly look at that and keep improving.
“I think there’s obviously things we need to get better at as a team. There’s been two strikes from distance really, two really good strikes from their point of view, that sometimes they fly in the top corner and more often than not they probably don’t.”
The transfer window saw United use its limited budget to reinforce the midfield with three new signings, but only Youri Tielemans has started the last two games. Andrey Santos has been warming the bench and Carlos Baleba is out injured.
United has conceded twice in all three games thus far, with serious question marks surrounding why an ageing defence was not bolstered in the transfer exercise.
United will need to pull up its socks with Manchester City visiting at Old Trafford next week.
Marcus Rashford’s form on his return to the Red Devils has been a silver lining for Carrick.
“He’s done ever so well since he came back. He looked really sharp again today and dangerous,” said the United gaffer.
“That final moment didn’t quite drop for him, but nevertheless I thought he created really good opportunities and gave us a big threat throughout the game really.”
(With inputs from Reuters)
Published on Sep 06, 2026
