Matheus Cunha on Carrick’s Magic at Manchester United
Matheus Cunha walked off the Old Trafford pitch with grass on his shirt, a goal to his name and a conviction he could barely hide: Michael Carrick, he believes, has brought a touch of Sir Alex Ferguson’s “magic” back to Manchester United.
The Brazilian had just scored the opener in a wild 3-2 win over Liverpool, a result that did more than wound their oldest rivals. It sealed Champions League qualification with three games to spare, an outcome that felt fanciful back in January when Ruben Amorim was dismissed and the club lurched, again, into uncertainty.
Inside the club, football director Jason Wilcox insisted the target remained clear – a return to Europe’s elite. Outside, few truly believed it. Carrick did. And crucially, so did his players.
Carrick’s Ferguson thread
Ten wins from 14 matches have turned Carrick from stop-gap to frontrunner. The 44-year-old, once the calm metronome of Ferguson’s last great side, now stands on the touchline trying to channel those years into something tangible.
Cunha feels that link every day.
“I sat on the bench with him,” he said, describing the way Carrick now works with the squad. “How he teaches everyone is amazing. He has the magic with these Ferguson times. Then he comes and brings it to us, teaches us how it was, to be part of everything. Then he did this.
“It’s amazing. He’s a pleasure. Of course, I think he deserves it.”
Those Ferguson years are no longer just history lessons on the walls of the museum. Carrick lived them. Five Premier League titles. A Champions League. Dressing rooms that demanded trophies, not excuses. Cunha sees that standard being quietly reintroduced, session by session.
And yet Carrick has been clear: Champions League qualification is not a finishing line. It is a marker.
United still need four more points to be sure of a top-three spot, something they have managed only four times since Ferguson retired in 2013. They are also on course to finish fewer than 12 points behind the eventual champions, a gap they have only once bettered in the post-Ferguson era, under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer in 2020-21.
The numbers are modest by the old standards of this club. In the current context, they feel like a platform.
“The Champions League without this club is not the same”
For Cunha, the return to the top table is non-negotiable.
“It’s one of the biggest privileges I have to play at this club,” he said. “The Champions League without this club is not the same competition, and this club without Champions League is not same club.
“But it is not only the Champions League. We need to fight for the titles. This is the first one [step]. We could come much stronger for next season.”
There it is: the shift in tone United have been desperate to hear from inside their own dressing room. Not relief at scraping back into the competition, but expectation that this should be the baseline.
Carrick’s United are not there yet. They still bend under pressure, still leave doors open at the back, still carry scars from a decade of missteps. Yet in Cunha’s words, and in his performances, there is a sense that the standards he talks about are starting to be lived, not just repeated.
Casemiro’s future – and a dressing room voice
The summer will test all of that. Change is coming at Old Trafford, and not only in the dugout.
Casemiro, Cunha’s Brazil team-mate and one of the most decorated midfielders of his generation, has said he is leaving. Carrick backed up that stance when he spoke to the media on Friday. The story, on the surface, looks straightforward.
Cunha is not so sure it’s that simple.
“It’s so easy to talk about him,” he said. “I know how important he is.
“He’s an amazing guy. There is a strong part of him outside the pitch. He’s so lovely and so friendly. He teaches me.
“We don’t know in the end how it is with his contract. Of course, everyone hopes there’s a little bit more. I know it’s harder than we talked about, but, in the end, you never know.”
There is admiration there, but also a glimpse into the emotional core of this squad. Casemiro is not just a name on a wage bill to these players. He is a reference point, a mentor, a daily presence. If he goes, United lose more than a defensive midfielder. If he stays, Carrick keeps a powerful ally in the dressing room.
Cunha delivers on the big stage
Cunha, meanwhile, has been doing exactly what United paid Wolves £62.5m for him to do. He arrived last summer as a priority target, a big personality unafraid of big stages. Old Trafford has not swallowed him. It has given him a platform.
His strike against Liverpool was his ninth of the season, part of a catalogue of crucial contributions. He has already delivered winners at Arsenal and Chelsea under Carrick, goals that changed the feel of the campaign and, perhaps, the trajectory of the manager’s future.
He plays with a certain swagger, the kind that can irritate opponents and energise supporters. And when he scores, everyone knows what’s coming.
The surfing celebration has followed him from club to club, but against Liverpool it evolved. After sliding across the turf, chased by jubilant team-mates, Cunha sprang up and mimed paddling before standing tall on an imaginary board, riding the noise of Old Trafford.
“I’ve improved my celebration a little bit,” he said. “Every time, my friends in Brazil every time say, ‘you cannot only surf, you have to paddle and stand up on the surfboard’. I said OK, I’ll try to improve.
“It’s part of my life; to bring this into football and show everyone how happy I am to play football and surf. I have to do it.”
There is joy in that image, but also something else: a player comfortable enough, and confident enough, to express himself at a club that has often looked weighed down by its own past.
Carrick, with his quiet authority and Ferguson-era memories, has given Cunha and his team-mates the freedom to play – and the demand to win. The Champions League place is secured. The standards, Cunha insists, are only just being set.
If this really is the start of a new cycle at Old Trafford, the question now is simple: how far can Carrick’s “magic” actually take them?
