Carrick secures Champions League – what are Man Utd waiting for?

“You want to follow him. You want to fight for him. You want to die for him on the pitch. We showed that today.”

Kobbie Mainoo’s assessment of manager Michael Carrick on Sky Sports after Manchester United beat Liverpool 3-2 in the Premier League resonated.

It resonated because when Mainoo scored his 77th-minute winner at Old Trafford, the stadium announcer made a point of hailing the homegrown, local-born 21-year-old, who signed his new long-term contract on Thursday.

Mainoo has become the poster boy for the club.

That is amazing because he had a request to join Napoli on loan turned down last summer, did not start a league game for the first five months of the season and was preparing for tough discussions over his future in January before Ruben Amorim got the boot.

Former Manchester City defender Micah Richards told BBC Sport: “Watching him play, you really can see the difference that Carrick has made, in terms of the previous manager not believing in him, and then the new manager coming in and giving him so much confidence. You can see that self-belief in his performances.”

Bringing Mainoo back into the fold – and getting him to play at a high level – is just one of Carrick’s completed tasks since he was asked to guide his old club through to the end of the season.

He has also restored skipper Bruno Fernandes to his favourite position and overseen wins over City, Arsenal, Tottenham, Aston Villa, Chelsea and now Liverpool – the first time United have done the league double over their old rivals since 2015-16.

In addition, the 44-year-old has taken United back into the Champions League after a two-year absence.

Typically, Carrick did not want to speak about his future.

“Whatever it is going to happen is going to happen,” he said.

But, in talking around the situation as he was peppered by the media in his post-match briefing, he did seem to go slightly further than he has before.

“I love doing what I am doing,” he said. “It feels pretty natural. To be sat in this position is a good position to be in.”

Over the past four months there has been a lot of focus on what Carrick is not.

He is not a demonstrative individual, in news conferences or on the sideline. He does not charge around like Diego Simeone at Atletico Madrid.

His most expressive reactions on Sunday were in his exchanges with fourth official Anthony Taylor when it seemed decisions were going against his side in the first half.

We cannot know how he will react to playing games every three or four days, rather than once a week and sometimes not even that, although he did OK at Middlesbrough at the start before key players were sold.

We cannot know either how he will react to a losing sequence because it has not happened yet. United have won 10 out of 14 matches under Carrick. No team has accumulated more points during that period.

That is the reality. That is what United hierarchy will be discarding if they choose to replace Carrick in three games’ time.

Unless Paris St-Germain manager Luis Enrique can be persuaded to ditch Europe’s best team to switch to the Premier League, it is difficult to conceive of United coming up with an alternative that would be acceptable to either the fans, who bellowed Carrick’s name after the final whistle, or the players, who, if not quite in such blunt terms as Mainoo, are repeatedly praising their boss.

Club officials have said they want to wait and carry out a full assessment of the situation at the end of the season.

Is that necessary? Is there an argument to say Carrick’s status should be confirmed before the final home game of the season against Nottingham Forest on 17 May?

Carrick clearly feels, together with his coaching team and squad, that he has done a good job.

“It has been a good run,” he said. “We have beaten some very good teams.

“When we came in, the Champions League was a bit in the distance. We wanted to get back into Europe. To be there with three games to spare is a big achievement.

“One of the biggest things for me is trying to get the best out of players, helping people and letting them go out and perform.

“Then there is seeing this place alive and bouncing.

“The players need a lot of credit for the run we have put together and also the coaching staff. There is a lot of good work beyond me.

“The pleasing thing to see is the spirit and the camaraderie of the group, which you could see at 2-2, when they were sticking in and fighting for each other.

“We want a team to be proud of. It [the Champions League] is a huge step for so many reasons, and I am not underplaying that.

“But it can’t be everything. We expect more of that consistently. That is the message – let’s kick on.”

United fans would doubtless agree, especially those who remember the team Carrick was part of – and the ones before that – who were never allowed to settle for what they had done, as Sir Alex Ferguson always wanted more.

That is the mentality Carrick has.

Dion Dublin was part of Ferguson’s first Premier League title-winning squad. He understands the club.

“Beating Liverpool ticks all the boxes,” Dublin told BBC Radio 5 Live.

“It’s decision-making. It’s substitutions at the right time. He’s got his team to find a way to get a result. That’s what a manager does.

“Well done Carrick. Well done United.”