The victim of scapegoatism?
It seems the common trend nowadays for a large number of Manchester United fans on social networking sites (ie twitter) is to criticise players when we fail to win or fail to win by at least a 3 goal margin. And the blame always falls on the few individuals who had once upon a time hit a bad patch of form which lives in the memory long term and suddenly makes them the worst player in Manchester United history and unfit to wear the shirt ever again.
I suppose by now you’ve figured out which players I’m talking about as I’m sure most of you have either witnessed or joined in with the ‘Carrick,’ ‘Evans’ or ‘Gibson’ bashing after we fail to win. After Manchester United’s 1-1 away draw to Benfica, surprise surprise, the critics came out in force and who was to blame for the failure to win? Mainly Carrick with a hint of Evans. Personally I felt that, although they did not have a stormer, they didn’t play particularly bad either. In fact I thought both of them were amongst our better performers on the night. Both were very assured on the ball, displayed by the 86 passes Carrick made and the 92% completion rate and Jonny Evans’ 58 passes and 98% completion rate.
Michael Carrick also made 8 interceptions against Benfica and 4 tackles. It could be argued that he was in fact our best player on the night, yet as expected, the Carrick haters came out in force. Some comments sent to me when defending Carrick on twitter:
“Passing sideways, backwards, to opposing players, NO PACE & contributing sod all going forward, is why many fans hate Carrick.”
“That’s because both of them are s*** the whole midfield tonight was shit and not one of them should play for united again.”
“Carrick is f***in pony.”
“How many passes did carrick make that actually did anything? He was s***e nowhere near best player that goes to Giggs & anders.”
“This doesn’t mean anything when your passing is without taking any risks,he passed sideways,and back,no offensive passes… carrick is really useless,he does nothing,can’t defend,and can’t attack,he passes the ball and never ask it back,TC (Tom Cleverley) any day.”
“Michael Carrick is STILL s***e.”
“We all watched the game. Carrick sucked. period.”
“Best #Mufc performers last night were A. Lindergaard. P. Evra. C Smaling. R. Giggs. Worst was M. Carrick and J. Evens.”
“Carrick is just not United material.”
Michael Carrick in his new role
The above image shows the position that Michael Carrick now regularly operates in. It is a much deeper role than any other midfielder at Manchester United plays in. Michael Carrick doesn’t go forward often, he chooses, or is more likely instructed by the manager, to sit deep and limit the opportunities in which he goes forwards. Tactically this kind of position has to be a disciplined one. He “contibutes sod all going forward.” I think from his position, he isn’t directly supposed to.
If Michael Carrick loses the ball from such a position attempting to complete a risky pass which is unlikely to actually reach it’s destination then possession is lost cheaply and it may also eventually lead to a chance on goal for the opposing team. Regardless, Michael Carrick did in fact attempt 14 long passes last night against Benfica and completed 12 of them, a stat that was very noticeable as he often switched the play to the other side of the pitch.
Now as the passing chalkboard for Michael Carrick v Benfica isn’t readily available at my disposal, I shall instead use his chalkboard from the Bolton v Manchester United game from last Saturday.
The chalkboard itself highlights the area in which Michael Carrick currently plays in with most of his passes being made from deep. It was a role in which I felt bought out the best in Anderson who had the freedom to do almost anything he wanted in the midfield. That match he attempted 51 passes and completed 46, which is a completion rate of 90%. Here is a breakdown of his passing stats: (Completed/Attempted). Backward: (17/17), Square (or sideways as people like to call it): (10/11). Forward: (19/23). It’s clear to see why Michael Carrick is known for his lack of passes forward(!). Note that this is the only league game that he has played in so far this season.
The league game that he played in before Bolton away was Blackburn away last season. That day Michael Carrick attempted 108 passes and completed 97 of them which is a completion rate, again, of 90%.
A breakdown of his stats from that day: Backward: (20/20). Square: (30/32). FORWARD: (47/56). A clear conclusion from the stats of both of these games would be that this “Carrick only passes backwards and sideways” mindset of some fans is just a pure and simple myth. If that can’t convince you, Michael Carrick also completed more forward passes in last season’s Champions League than Barcelona’s Andres Iniesta. Michael Carrick made 417, Andres Iniesta made 384. That stat does it for me.
So why do people single out and make a scapegoat out of one or two players? I can’t really say for sure since I’m not someone who does that sort of thing. The direct criticism of one player for an overall below par team performance is just wrong in itself. It seems to me that people are just jumping on the bandwagon, that it has somehow become fashionable to blame the same players over and over again because that player started ahead of or isn’t really their favourite. Nevertheless, the blame of the same player every time Man Utd fail to win is wholly unwarranted.
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my mistake. Am impressed with the stats. Read also he had the most interception last senson in the CL than any other player.
Countersigned.
If I was to write a similar article, it would pretty much come out word for word.
Carrick and Evans are better players for United than some of those slagging them off are fans. I would rather those not ‘support’ United again, as opposed to our players not play for the club again. Especially when you can pull stats (which are facts) out of the hat like that.
If you’re not a flair player, you’re shit. That’s all.
It has nothing to do with if a player has been asked to perform a role and continues to do the same job week in week out.
Brilliant piece, Vik. Don’t expect everyone to be able to understand though.
I know! I don’t know what made you think I thought he did (no edit…honest!)
It was a poor game. In the aftermath some vent on players, seemingly unable to separate form from skill, some vent on venting supporters. Both camps are tedious.
Ha ha! Obviously it was so well written Steve assumed I wrote it 😉
So people who slag Carrick are ignorant.
Right I think you should ask SAF to sell Anderson, anyway he will get slagged by those who think they know better.
We may not get as much for him as we could get for Carrick,right? Wrong.
BTW, what would we really get for Carrick? I hope he does not play against City.
To be a true United fan we need to forget what a player’s nationality is, just the good of United. Period.
That is if you want the best from abroad and you want to keep them.Especially if you want to keep them.
Yesterday’s game seems out of the season 2010/2011. Not to go crazy, when Carrick is in the lineup united game becomes more defensive than offensive.
i was very surprised that he made more forward passes than Iniesta!
It’s amazing how people who know nothing bout soccer keep haranguing us about Michael Carrick. The guy sometimes gets the dirty role and executes it to plan; and yet these yobs wont appreciate him,nor let him be. To think that nothing was said about Wazza’s unproductive swagger or Valencia’s wastefulness on the night makes it even more annoying. It’s nothing short of questioning SAF’s judgment, if not his sanity, when the choices he makes are criticized with so much bile. ‘Nuf’s ‘nuf!!!
I know something about soccer. If we don’t play Carrick in a CL final we will have a better chance of winning. We score more goals when he is not on the field. That’s a fact. When fans get excited about our football guess who is missing. Did that ever occur to you?
What’s wrong with a questioning SAF’s judgement? He gets it right most of the time. Sometimes he doesn’t. When he does. Questions will be asked. That’s normal.
Carrick is always going to get a bashing I am not a fan of his but he has my support and i’m sure many others who call him sh#t as he is a united player. The major problem was the style of play changed from the very exciting one touch to a terrible give the ball away game. A lot of this had to do with formation and most of the midfield hardly playing minutes and thus no cohesiveness but there was someone in the midfield by the name of carrick while definitely not his fault alone, because of the love hate relationship with the fans his name shall always be at the forefront. We are looking for someone to make things happen something inspirational, much of which do not get from Carrick individually and this is where the problem is. The lineups for the first macthes of the epl where playing as a unit those who played in UCL almost looked lost and the true moment of magic came from Giggs. It is simply moments like those that Carrick needs we all know he can pass the ball but it is time to evolve will he be doing that u said on consistent basis or just head of the class in what looks to me as the second string team only time will tell for this season and I believe it should be a final chance for many even one of my favourites andesron. I hope all play well and evolve cause we are looking for improvement Manchester United spells progress and records. United for ever long live fergie even though don’t agree with u either sometimes sir u obviously was looking at a point for the best result u crafty old devil n now everyone in the camp is happy with a game under their belts except a few where is Berbatov, owen, macheda I ask and we want pogba should ring out on sunday so we can see him in the carling
Bro, your valiant attempt to defend Carrick and Evans is just pathetic. In case you really were watching the Benfica match, you would have noticed, in horror, how the Benfica striker controlled a long ball and turned Evans with consummate ease to score the goal? Evans is just plain rubbish. How many back-passes he made? And Carrick used to be better a bit but now lacks confidence and hence floundering. Hopefully these two “stalwarts” don’t make too many appearances. Utd are not in the business of being polite and nice to some fringe players. It’s all about winning and it can only be achieved with top quality without compromise.
All you are saying is true. But i still have issue with Carrick: He is a big strong lad but time and again we see him coming off second best in tussles with players much smaller than him, this make him seem uncommitted. Also it doesn’t help that we don’t see him asking for the ball or running hard to close down in midfield. Most of those interceptions mention in the article occur when the opponent is coming towards him, its never him chasing them down and making the interception. Also even if you’ve been assigned a role we the fans expect you to see when there is an opportunity to do something different which will push the cause of the team. eg, against benfica their midfield and defence just dropped off whenever Carrick had the ball in anticipation of a pass. This meant all his forward options were marked but left him with lots of space in front off him, however, he never pushed forward into the space. He was content to just play a back or square pass. I like Carrick. I know he is a very good player and that is where my frustration and i believe most funs frustrations come from. We know what he can do so when he is not doing it, it is as if he is not committed.
i am with fido, whenever carrick is on the field we score less goal and also we loss when we are playin against big clubs, he even contributed in our loosin. Carrick is a lazy player lyk berbatov, we don’t care about passing completion, all we care is about effective passin that can lead to winnin.
Carrick played well and helped the team get a good away result against a decent team.
Carrick is a winner, unlike most of the losers posting their comments here.
It’s probably time for Cleverly, but we’re damn lucky to have a player of Carrick’s class a back up to play in such an important Champions League game.