Elite-level incompetence is Manchester United’s problem – not Michael Carrick | Barney Ronay

Getting rid of Michael Carrick is not going to solve the problems that led to his appointment. Perhaps it’s worth, for once, doing something different

At the final whistle at Elland Road the TV cameras cut to a lingering shot of Manchester United chief executive Omar Berrada, looking down pensively from the stands, deciding, it is to be hoped, on a little clemency, a re-sheathing of the managerial shotgun.

Here we have the man who hired the man. The man who fires the man. The man who also hired or rehired the previous two men he had to fire. Berrada was poached from Manchester City on the basis of his ability to grow commercial revenue (yes, OK, stop laughing), and appears, like everyone else with any actual reach around here, to exist in a strangely consequence-free bubble.

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