Michael Carrick vs Ruben Amorim: Are Manchester United Actually Better, Or Just Getting Over The Line?

Manchester United are winning football matches, which naturally means everyone has gone completely normal about it. Michael Carrick has come in, steadied the ship, stacked up points, beaten some big sides and suddenly the mood around Old Trafford has shifted from full-blown crisis documentary to “maybe the interim deserves the job”.

And look, on the surface, the Carrick bounce is real.

Across his first 12 Premier League games this season, Carrick has delivered 8 wins, 2 draws and 2 defeats, taking 26 points from 36. Ruben Amorim’s equivalent opening 12-game run produced 5 wins, 3 draws and 4 defeats, worth 18 points from 36.

That is not a small gap. That is the difference between “top-four charge” and “everyone on Sky Sports gets a turn drawing arrows on a touchscreen”.

But here’s where it gets interesting.

The results say Carrick has transformed United. The underlying numbers suggest something slightly different: Amorim’s United may actually have been producing better attacking performances, creating better chances, controlling more of the ball and getting into better areas — but not landing the results.

In other words, Amorim might have been building the better performance base, while Carrick has simply found the short-term sweet spot: less noise, better moments, more points.

And as always with Manchester United, there’s a massive bucket of red-card nonsense thrown in for good measure.

The Results: Carrick Wins This Bit Comfortably

Let’s start with the obvious.

On points, Carrick has smashed it.

He has taken eight more points than Amorim over the same number of Premier League games. United have scored slightly more, conceded significantly fewer and turned themselves into a side that actually looks capable of getting over the line.

That matters. Football is not played on spreadsheets, sadly for all of us trying to win arguments online.

Carrick has made United more efficient. He has made them harder to beat. He has got big results against big sides. He has brought short-term calm to a club that usually treats calm like a suspicious package.

But if we stop there, we miss the real story.

Because the performance data does not scream “massive tactical upgrade”. It whispers something far more annoying: variance, finishing, game state, red cards and short-term momentum might be doing a lot of the heavy lifting.

The Underlying Numbers: Amorim Has a Case

According to Planet Football’s comparison of Amorim’s final 12 Premier League games against Carrick’s first 12, United’s underlying attacking numbers were actually stronger under Amorim in several key areas.

That is the part that makes the Carrick narrative more complicated.

Amorim’s United were creating more xG per game, giving up less xG per game, creating slightly more big chances, having more of the ball and getting more touches in the opposition box. Carrick has the better results, but Amorim’s underlying profile was arguably more sustainable on paper.

And that is exactly the kind of annoying football argument that ruins group chats.

Because Amorim’s United often looked like a team doing a lot of the right things but not quite converting those moments into points. Carrick’s United look more pragmatic, more settled and more ruthless — but perhaps not quite as dominant underneath the surface.

Basically:

Amorim won the performance argument. Carrick is winning the actual football matches.

And unfortunately for Amorim, the league table does not currently have a column for “played alright, to be fair”.

Amorim’s Problem: Performances Without Pay-Off

The fairest reading of Amorim’s opening spell is that United were not completely hopeless. They were just painfully inefficient.

They had matches where they created enough to take more. They had phases where the structure looked promising. They had attacking numbers that suggested something was starting to click.

But the results kept falling the wrong way.

That is the killer at Manchester United. You do not get six months of “the xG is trending nicely” when the actual scoreline keeps punching you in the face.

Amorim’s United were too often nearly good.

Nearly controlled.
Nearly dangerous.
Nearly unlucky.
Nearly building something.

But “nearly” is a dangerous word at Old Trafford. It keeps managers in press conferences explaining why things are better than they look, while everyone else points at the table and starts Googling replacement candidates.

The Everton defeat is probably the perfect example. Idrissa Gueye was sent off after 13 minutes for slapping his own team-mate Michael Keane, and United still lost 1-0 at Old Trafford. That is not just a bad result. That is the kind of result that makes a fanbase start speaking in court evidence.

Amorim could argue process. United fans could argue trauma.

Both would be right.

Carrick’s Strength: Short-Term Clarity

Carrick’s biggest win has not necessarily been reinventing Manchester United. It has been simplifying them.

That is not a criticism. In fact, it is probably exactly what they needed.

There are times when a club needs a grand philosophy, positional rotations, rest-defence diagrams and a manager who says “control” 47 times in a press conference.

And then there are times when a club needs someone to walk in, stop the bleeding, pick a sensible team and make sure the players remember they are allowed to win football matches.

Carrick feels like the second one.

He has not turned United into an all-conquering machine. The underlying numbers suggest the improvement is not as dramatic as the results make it look. But he has made them more efficient in both boxes, and in the short term, that is absolutely massive.

United are not dominating every opponent. They are not suddenly a perfectly balanced football team. They are not playing like peak Barcelona with a Casemiro software update.

But they are taking chances, seeing out games and turning marginal moments into points.

That matters in a Premier League season where the margins are tiny.

The Red Card Factor: This Comparison Is Messier Than It Looks

One of the biggest reasons not to overreact either way is the red-card swing.

Across the 24 matches in the comparison, seven involved red cards. Carrick’s sample had five red-card games. Amorim’s had two.

That is a huge amount of match-state weirdness.

Carrick had games where opponents went down to 10 men, including Tottenham, Crystal Palace and Newcastle. United took advantage in some of those, but not all. The Crystal Palace game was a major turning point, with Maxence Lacroix sent off and United going on to win 2-1.

But Carrick also had chaos go against him. Harry Maguire was sent off in the draw with Bournemouth. Lisandro Martinez was sent off against Leeds, a decision Carrick strongly criticised afterwards.

Amorim had the Chelsea madness, where Robert Sanchez was sent off early for Chelsea before Casemiro later got himself dismissed too. United won 2-1, but it was hardly a normal tactical sample.

Then came the Everton game, where United played against 10 men for most of the match and still lost.

So when people say “Carrick is miles better” or “Amorim was clearly better underneath it all”, the red cards are a useful reminder that football analysis is rarely that clean.

Some of these games were not normal 11-v-11 football matches. They were Premier League fever dreams with VAR, panic and grown men making life choices in real time.

The Real Difference Might Be Marginal

This is the big point.

Carrick’s results are clearly better. That cannot be hand-waved away.

But the difference in performance level may not be as big as the table suggests.

Amorim’s United had a better xG profile, more possession, more box entries and more big chances created. Carrick’s United have better finishing, better results and a better defensive record in actual goals conceded.

That could mean Carrick has improved the mentality and game management.

It could mean Amorim’s team were unlucky and Carrick’s team are running hot.

It could mean the players are more comfortable with a simpler short-term structure.

It could mean all three.

What it probably does not mean is that United have suddenly discovered a long-term answer just because the interim manager is banking points at a much better rate.

Carrick might be the right man for the moment. That does not automatically make him the right man for the project.

And Amorim may have deserved more credit for the underlying performance level. That does not automatically mean he deserved more time if the results were not landing.

Football is cruel like that. The process can be decent and still get you sacked. The results can be excellent and still hide future problems.

Welcome to Manchester United, where every answer is actually just another argument.

So, Who Comes Out Better?

If this is a straight results-based comparison, Carrick wins easily.

Eight wins from 12 is serious. A points-per-game rate of 2.17 is Champions League-level form. United have moved up the table, restored belief and started winning the kind of matches they were previously turning into open-heart surgery.

But if this is a performance-based comparison, Amorim has more of a defence than people might think.

His United created more, controlled more and gave up fewer expected goals. The performances may have been better than the results. The problem was that the results were bad enough to make the performances feel irrelevant.

Carrick has been more effective. Amorim may have been more sustainable.

That is the tension.

And for United, the decision now is whether they want to reward the short-term fix or look deeper at what the numbers are saying.

Because if Carrick’s results are built on marginal gains, favourable moments and a finishing swing, there is a danger of mistaking a bounce for a blueprint.

But equally, if he keeps winning, nobody is going to care whether the xG has a sad little face.

Final Statr Verdict

Carrick has earned credit. No doubt.

He has made Manchester United competitive again, picked up big wins, tightened the actual scorelines and dragged the club away from another full-blown identity crisis.

But the Amorim comparison is not the landslide the points table suggests.

The underlying numbers say Amorim’s United were creating more, controlling more and producing better chance quality. Carrick’s United are simply converting the moments, managing the chaos and banking the points.

So maybe the real conclusion is this:

Carrick has fixed the results. Amorim may not have been as broken as the results made him look.

And that is the uncomfortable bit for United.

Because short-term Carrick might be exactly what they needed.

Long-term Carrick?