Manchester United’s Milan loss leaves Carrick with an awkward pre-season answer

Manchester United’s final pre-season result is not supposed to matter much. Losing 4-2 after leading twice rather changes the tone. AC Milan, led by former United manager Ruben Amorim, exposed enough in Wroclaw to leave Michael Carrick with a week to consider the parts of his side that did not hold together when the game turned.

There were useful signs: Marcus Rashford, Kobbie Mainoo and Lisandro Martinez made their first appearances of pre-season; Bruno Fernandes and Youri Tielemans completed 90 minutes; and there appeared to be no fresh injury concern. Yet the value of those details sits beside a more immediate problem. Three of Milan’s four goals were close-range efforts, while Ruben Loftus-Cheek ran beyond Martinez before driving past Senne Lammens. The scoreline did not invent United’s concerns. It concentrated them.

The gaps were small. The consequences were not.

The reported issue was not a defence and midfield separated by huge distances. It was a side failing to cover the spaces that did exist adequately. That distinction matters because it points less to a single dramatic collapse than to a problem of reaction, support and responsibility when Milan moved the ball.

United appeared especially vulnerable when Milan switched play to their right. Luke Shaw, who also played the full game, had too much ground to cover to reach the wing and too little support once he got there. That is the sort of pre-season flaw a coaching staff can identify quickly, but identifying it is only the first part. Hull City will provide a competitive setting in which the same movements will carry a greater price.

Lammens limited the damage, according to the account of the match. Without him, the margin may have been worse. That should make the four conceded goals more than an irritating footnote to a six-match pre-season that had otherwise been largely positive. A goalkeeper preventing a heavier defeat is useful; it is not an argument that the structure in front of him worked.

One of Milan’s goals was regarded by those with replays as offside, though there was no VAR in operation in Wroclaw. Carrick can reasonably note that qualification. He cannot use it to remove the other evidence of Milan reaching close range, nor Loftus-Cheek’s run beyond Martinez.

Santos has a difficult lesson before the league begins

Andrey Santos had impressed across United’s first five matches of the summer. Against Milan, however, the recent signing’s inexperience was exposed. That is not a final judgement on a player after one pre-season match; it is the precise reason this defeat has more use than a routine result might suggest.

Pre-season can flatter a team when its new combinations are moving in one direction. It can also reveal which player is still being asked to process too much when the opposition finds a route through. Milan’s switches, United’s incomplete cover and Santos’ difficult afternoon form a connected issue rather than three separate complaints.

Carrick’s response after the match was blunt: We are disappointed with today. We didn’t play very well. There are no excuses. The useful part of that verdict is its lack of decoration. United had led twice, but the result still asks whether their midfield and defensive support can remain connected once an opponent changes the point of attack.

That question will travel back to Manchester with Carrick. The Premier League opener at promoted Hull City is on Saturday, followed by a match against Ipswich. Those fixtures will say more about his choices than a friendly can, yet Milan has narrowed the areas requiring a decision.

Rashford’s return is meaningful, not conclusive

Rashford’s first appearance for Manchester United since the Europa League match away at Viktoria Plzen on 12 December 2024 is plainly significant. The 28-year-old had been effectively banished by Amorim, then loaned first to Aston Villa and then Barcelona. He was not expected to return from Barcelona.

He entered with an hour played as one of six substitutes, wearing the vacant number nine shirt. United officials were quick to say the shirt was not permanent, a warning against treating an administrative detail as a decision on his future. Carrick had opportunities in Maynooth to say Rashford would definitely remain beyond the month, and did not do so.

That leaves the return with a deliberately limited meaning. Rashford received a positive reception when warming up, applauded supporters in the corner towards which he was running, and looked relaxed. Within seconds of that first warm-up, Samuel Chukwueze scored Milan’s first equaliser at the same end. The coincidence is memorable, though it does not explain the goal.

Once on the pitch, Rashford stayed wider than Patrick Dorgu, the player he replaced on the left. His first run ended in a foul conceded. A later piece of play by the corner flag took him past an opponent and brought many in the crowd to their feet. It was, as the match account put it, solid rather than spectacular.

That is enough for a return. It is not enough to settle a transfer question. The deadline on 1 September is the point at which the uncertainty becomes permanent in one direction or another. Until then, every appearance can be read as both a football decision and a clue. Neither reading is automatically right.

A number nine shirt cannot do the explaining

Rashford’s shirt number made a useful piece of visual noise around a player whose status remains unclear. The football was quieter. He played wide after replacing Dorgu, had one early foul and produced a moment near the corner flag that lifted the crowd. There is no basis in that cameo for declaring either a full reconciliation or an imminent departure.

There is, though, a practical consequence for Carrick. A squad preparing for Hull has to account for the player available to it now, while a transfer window can still change the squad available after 1 September. Rashford’s selection against Milan confirms that he can be involved. It does not reveal the length or shape of that involvement.

United’s scorers against Milan were Dorgu and Harry Maguire. Rashford did not need to turn his reintroduction into a decisive performance for the occasion to matter. His presence made an unresolved issue visible again; the defeat ensured it was not the only issue demanding attention.

The result is a warning, not a season verdict

Few at Old Trafford may remember this particular day once the season is under way. That does not make it disposable. Milan gave Carrick a specific picture: switches to the right created a difficult workload for Shaw, the spaces between United’s defensive and midfield lines were not covered well enough, and a player who had caught the eye in five earlier friendlies encountered the limits of experience.

The calculation is uncomplicated. United scored two and conceded four, a deficit of two goals. More revealing is the manner of the concession count: three close-range Milan finishes, plus Loftus-Cheek getting beyond Martinez and finishing past Lammens. A pre-season finale cannot decide what United will be, but it can decide what they must stop being before Saturday.

Rashford’s return offers a separate uncertainty, and it is tempting to make it the whole story because it comes with history, a vacant number nine shirt and a deadline. The sharper reading is less theatrical. Carrick has a possible selection question around Rashford, and a clearer defensive problem already in front of him. Milan made sure those two things arrived together.

Research: This article uses the archived evidence supplied for this story. Story inspiration: BBC Sport's original report.