England legend Rio Ferdinand has backed his former teammate Michael Carrick to become the permanent manager of Manchester United from his interim role currently at the club, Softfootball reports.
Carrick replaced Ruben Amorim, who was sacked following some poor results and felling to get the team used to his 3-4-3 formation that was so successful in Portugal with Sporting Lisbon.
Ferdinand was at the Emirates where he witnessed Carrick led Manchester United to a fearless 3-2 victory over Arsenal. It was a majestic win against the premier league leaders, just a week after beating archrivals Manchester City 2-0 at Old Trafford.
Ferdinand was speaking on his official podcast Rio Meets and expressed his surprise that some people still don’t want Carrick to be given the job permanently. He said:
People are telling me that no matter what Michael Carrick does, he shouldn’t get the opportunity to manager Manchester United and I’m looking at it and going, rah, two weeks ago, Man United were in a sorry state of affairs. We were the butt of everyone’s jokes. It was a debacle, what we were looking at. Michael Carrick has come in and turned the collars up on his long trench coat, right and said listen guys ‘Get behind me and we are gonna put you in a structure that’s gonna actually suit the players that we have. We goona be hard to play against and we gonna work hard and we gonna be a threat.
Some people might worry that the last time an interim was appointed permanently at Manchester United he ended up getting sacked and that person is Ole Gunnar Solskjaer.
Interestingly, after Amorim left Solskjaer was favourite to return as interim but he wanted a more permanent role and that gave the chance to Carrick who was open for the opportunity to take over from the caretaker boss at the time Darren Fletcher.
Here is the video of the Rio Ferdinand interview as shared by the official podcast of Rio Meets. Watch below.
“People are telling me Michael Carrick shouldn’t get an opportunity to manage Man United”
CC: @rioferdy5, @joelbeya, @MrStephenHowson pic.twitter.com/JSOxi0mYwW
— Rio Ferdinand Presents (@RioMeets) January 25, 2026The win over Manchester City and Arsenal takes Manchester United into fourth place with 38 points on the premier league table after 23 matches so far.
