Manchester United are expected to relieve Michael Carrick of his duties as head coach.
United have headed into the international break sitting 18th and in the Premier League’s relegation zone following Sunday’s dramatic 4-4 draw with Aston Villa at Old Trafford.
The club continue to insist that no decision has been reached but multiple sources, speaking to The Athletic on the condition of anonymity to protect relationships, indicate work has been undertaken on potential replacements and the anticipation is a change will be made before the trip to Anfield to face Liverpool in 13 days’ time.
United States head coach Mauricio Pochettino would be expected to figure highly among the candidates while former Newcastle United head coach Eddie Howe and Julian Nagelsmann, most recently in charge of Germany, have admirers at the club.
A final call on Carrick’s future will require approval from co-owner Sir Jim Ratcliffe and the club’s majority owners, the Glazer family.
The former midfielder’s position has been precarious for a number of weeks after a start to the season that has seen his side win just once in the league and only three times in all competitions.
Following the 3-0 home defeat to Bournemouth last month United’s hierarchy had opted to give Carrick and his players more time to turn their fortunes around.
Those three games yielded only one victory, however — against Roma in the Champions League — with the expectation now that the 45-year-old’s short-lived period in permanent charge will come to an end before the team next play.
Carrick was appointed United’s permanent head coach on a two-year contract in May following a successful period in interim charge, having replaced Ruben Amorim in January.
That initially temporary spell began with United seventh in the Premier League, but he oversaw a marked improvement in form, with United taking 39 points from their remaining 17 games and finishing third.
No other club picked up more league points last season following Carrick’s appointment, with United’s run including victories over Manchester City, Arsenal, Liverpool and Chelsea.
That run of domestic form has not continued into the current campaign, however, with United winning just one of their opening 10 Premier League games, and being eliminated from the Carabao Cup by Brighton & Hove Albion.
How has it come to this again?
Analysis by Manchester United correspondent Cerys Jones
At the end of last season, few would have believed the speed at which Michael Carrick’s Manchester United reign would sour, and the speed at which another of the club hierarchy’s biggest decisions appears to be ending in a costly, humiliating about-face.
Carrick transformed the mood at United last season with a back-to-basics approach that empowered individuals to play to their strengths. Champions League qualification was achieved with room to spare. He simplified on-pitch issues that had felt so complicated under Ruben Amorim.
Positive foundations were laid, but far from building on those in the opening weeks of the season, they have crumbled.
A historically poor run of form has sent the mood through the floor, and faith in Carrick having the acumen, experience, and authority to turn things around has dissipated as quickly as the momentum behind him gathered last season.
Carrick’s failings also shine an increasingly unforgiving light on those above him, too. This is the third head coach — following Erik ten Hag and Amorim — that has received the backing of the INEOS-led hierarchy only for things to rapidly unravel. How many chances do they need to pick the correct coach to lead the clear playing identity Sir Jim Ratcliffe promised when he took over?
There are major questions over recruitment, too. Injuries are not the sole reason Carrick’s reign has gone downhill, but a lack of depth at left-back and centre-forward certainly has not helped. Could the summer budget have been allocated differently? Has the approach to investment, as appeared to be the case with Lisandro Martinez, created damaging disillusionment in the squad? For as long as the shadow of Glazer debt continues to hang over the club, how much can they progress?
“Changing, changing, changing manager? What about other areas?” Martinez said last month. Whether those comments foreshadow any of those above Carrick also taking the fall remains to be seen.