Does this late, late comeback draw keep Michael Carrick in his job? He urged United to back up their breathless Roma comeback victory on Tuesday by building momentum and they did, kind of, by avoiding defeat.
Patrick Dorgu’s 96th-minute equaliser went off his head and in. Senne Lammens, up for the corner, knocked into his opposite number, Zion Suzuki, but no foul was given – to Unai Emery’s disquiet, Aston Villa’s manager pointing to this afterwards. This made it 4-4 to follow Joshua Zirkzee’s added-time finish as Villa were somehow pulled back by Carrick’s chaotic unit.
Manchester United v Aston Villa: Premier League – liveRead moreChris Kavanagh soon blew for time but not before further bedlam as the referee sent off what appeared to be a member of Villa’s technical staff.
Before all of this Lammens (twice), Diogo Dalot and Leny Yoro were culpable for Villa’s goals. What can any manager do if a trio of players shoot the team in both feet with the schoolboy defending that allowed Alysson to score a barely credible 59 seconds in, and Nicolas Jackson to double the lead after four minutes?
Both these goals were Lammens’s fault. Then, after a rousing Roma‑esque first-half comeback to make it 2-2 via Bruno Fernandes and Youri Tielemans, Dalot’s chop on Alysson two minutes into the second period conceded the season’s clearest penalty, which John McGinn dispatched. Further farce followed via Yoro’s own what-are-you-doing moment: a flying header towards his own net that led to Leon Goretzka’s fourth goal for Emery’s team.
The bottom line is that United have still won three games all season, from 15, and only one of these in the league, on 30 August, when Ipswich were beaten 5-2.
Carrick may well cling on because Jason Wilcox has been reluctant to fire the head coach so far. Yet United enter the international break in a bewildering 18th place, so who knows? Carrick cuffed away a post‑match question that asked if he might walk away – for the good of the club. “I’m not,” was his curt reply.
For two minutes and 46 seconds his team were actually bottom of the table earlier in the day, when Sunderland went 1-0 up against Chelsea and before Liverpool took the lead at Crystal Palace.
The toxicity towards the United owners was summed up in the message, held up in letters and displayed in the Stretford End, to the Glazers and Sir Jim Ratcliffe: “Your funeral not ours, sell up”.
Villa’s lightning start was uber-professional from them and dismally amateurish from United: the ball arrived with Alysson and his shot went through Lammens’s legs.
United’s No 1 was in the dock again when Alysson’s effort went to the Belgian’s left and he pushed it out to Jackson, who smashed in for 2-0.
The joke beforehand was that even United could not lose by the 10‑goal margin needed to end the day in 20th place. The joke now was that United were in “hold my beer” territory.
Could they get a grip and retrieve a two-goal deficit, as they did versus Roma? Matheus Cunha, who scored twice against the Italian side, made a barnstorming charge into the right of Villa’s area that caused Boubacar Kamara to upend him. Kavanagh awarded the penalty and so Fernandes, as he did versus Roma, had the chance from the spot to pull a first goal back.
A hop-and-skip later it was game on again, Suzuki guessing the wrong way. This was 16 minutes in and the confusing rabble that is Carrick’s United took over as Villa were then pummelled until half-time.
View image in fullscreenLeon Goretzka bundles home Aston Villa’s fourth goal from close range. Photograph: Darren Staples/AFP/Getty ImagesUnited were all they had not been in the calamitous opening four minutes: slick, fast, and in charge in a 20-minute passage of pressure that was finally broken when Villa escaped their half, Pau Torres heading McGinn’s free-kick over.
United continued on. Their energy impressed and it said they still believed – in rescuing the match, and Carrick. Hard evidence arrived with Tielemans’s equaliser as Villa folded precisely as United had. Noussair Mazraoui’s cross came to the Belgian and he beat Suzuki. So, at the interval, the contest was all square after a breakneck opening half.
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What might the second period conjure? The answer: Dalot’s feeble trip on Alysson, as Carrick was a picture of despair. McGinn converted, to Lammens’s right, and it was 3-2 to Villa.
They stretched their advantage further due to more slapstick play from United. McGinn floated in a free-kick from the right, Yoro’s header forced Lammens to tip the ball on to the frame of the goal, and it rebounded and Goretzka bundled in.
Carrick had not found a place for Shea Lacey despite his impact as a substitute against Roma but on 65 minutes the head coach did, the youngster joined by Dorgu and Mason Mount in a triple change.
Tielemans, Amad Diallo and Dalot came off and the Portuguese seemed to be jeered: if so a rare occurrence here for United to boo one of their own. Then came Zirkzee and Dorgu’s goals that grabbed a point for United.
“Sacked in the morning” had been the Villa support’s taunt of Carrick. We wait to see if this is prescient. It is a 50‑50 shot, maybe.