Michael Carrick's Decision on Luke Shaw for Manchester City Clash
Michael Carrick will leave it as late as possible before deciding whether Luke Shaw can face Manchester City, with the defender still being nursed back after a recent setback.
Shaw, 31, missed Thursday night’s 4-0 Champions League win over Sabah FK, having been taken off in the 2-2 draw with Everton. Carrick and his staff opted against any gamble in midweek, even with European points on the line.
“We’ll have to see,” Carrick told reporters when pressed on Shaw’s chances for Sunday. “We just kind of looked after him a little bit. He wasn’t quite ready for [Sabah] 100%, so we didn’t risk it. We’ll see how he is over the next couple of days or so.”
A derby with City is never just another game. For Carrick, it carries an extra layer. This fixture mirrors the night his managerial journey in the Old Trafford dugout truly began.
Back in January, freshly installed as interim after Ruben Amorim’s departure, Carrick walked into this same showdown and walked out with a statement win. United, winless in four going into that match, produced a sharp, disciplined display to beat Pep Guardiola’s side, with Bryan Mbeumo and Patrick Dorgu striking the decisive blows.
That night helped shift the mood. It did not, Carrick insists, create a template.
“It’ll definitely be different, just because no games are ever the same,” he said. “I think there’s no way we’re assuming we won last year, we’ll do the same things and everything will be the same.
“I think the confidence that we’ve built over a period of time and feel like we’re getting better all the time, I think that helps us. We know it’s a big game, we know it’s an important game. There’s a lot riding on it, it’s pretty obvious to say, but we’re looking forward to it.
“We’ve got a short space of time to recover and prepare for it, but we’ll make the most of it.”
From Interim Gamble to Long-Term Bet
Carrick’s impact since that first meeting with City has been measured in hard numbers as well as mood. Twelve wins from his first 17 matches in charge turned an interim stop-gap into a permanent appointment at the Theatre of Dreams.
Outside the club, the noise was different. With INEOS stepping into the hierarchy, speculation swirled about a big-name arrival in the summer, a marquee coach to front a new era. Carrick never worked like a man waiting to be replaced.
“I think I said it pretty early on, I was always planning to be [manager beyond the summer],” he admitted. “All the decisions we were making were if we were going to be here for a period of time. I never knew how long that was going to be, I still don’t!
“But you’re always planning for the future, what we want it to look like and the direction we want to go, and that was from day one. The performance the lads gave was incredible with all that, but there was definitely always – has been, always will be for me – from the start was planning to try and get this club to where we want to get it in the long term.”
So Sunday is not just about revenge or repeat, not just about Shaw’s fitness or Guardiola’s tweaks. It is another checkpoint in a project Carrick insists he has been building for the long haul.
