Jamie Carragher reveals Manchester United substitution Michael Carrick got WRONG in Man City loss

Jamie Carragher feels Benjamin Sesko should have come on earlier - but not for Youri Tielemans

Michael Carrick made a mistake by substituting Youri Tielemans in the Manchester derby, because of the impact it had on Bruno Fernandes.

That is the view of Jamie Carragher who has analysed Manchester United’s controversial 1-0 loss to Manchester City at the weekend.

While Erling Haaland’s winning goal should NOT have stood due to Enzo Fernandez making an deliberate attempt to play the ball from an offside position, Man United did play the majority of the game with a one player advantage.

Phil Foden was shown a straight red card as early as the 23rd minute for kicking out at United captain Fernandes, leaving Man City with a huge mountain to climb at Old Trafford.

However, from the sending off to after Haaland’s goal, Man United didn’t create much in terms of goalscoring chances as Marcus Rashford and Kobbie Mainoo both struck the post before Bryan Mbeumo forced a super save from Gianluigi Donnarumma in stoppage time.

Speaking on Sky Sports’ Monday Night Football show, Carragher believes Carrick made the wrong call by taking off Tielemans in the 67th minute and not bringing on Benjamin Sesko sooner.

“Sesko comes on and they take a midfield player off in Tielemans,” Carragher said. “You might say ‘you’re losing 1-0, against ten men, you bring a striker on and take a midfielder off’, most managers would probably do that and say that’s what you should do.

“But the knock-on effect for Manchester United is that means Bruno Fernandes goes to central midfield.

“That was the change Michael Carrick made going the other way when Ruben Amorim was the manager. That’s why I go back to the tactical change and think they got it wrong.

Impacted: Bruno Fernandes

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After showing a still image of Patrick Dorgu, Joshua Zirkzee, Harry Maguire and Diogo Dalot in the last line of United’s attack late on, Carragher questioned why Fernandes wasn’t given license to get further forward.

He added. “The best player in the Premier League, the best player by a mile in the Manchester United team is Bruno Fernandes. Where is Bruno Fernandes here?

“Bruno Fernandes is here (on the halfway line), he’s marking Erling Haaland. This is in the 88th minute, there’s a couple of minutes left until we get to added time and the best player in the Premier League is marking Erling Haaland.

“Michael Carrick wouldn’t have wanted that but the point being, because he made that tactical decision to put him in central midfield, he’s ended up there because Bruno likes to get involved in everything.

“That was the knock-on effect of Michael Carrick’s decision to take Tielemans off and drop Bruno Fernandes deeper. He didn’t want him to be looking after Haaland, he didn’t want him deeper but, unfortunately, that was the knock-on effect of bringing a midfielder player off and Sesko not coming Cunha at half time.”