Michael Carrick said the mentality his side showed after going behind was the most pleasing aspect of Manchester United’s 5-2 win over Ipswich.
Bruno Fernandes’ hat-trick, Bryan Mbeumo’s sublime chip and a Jacob Greaves own goal gave United a resounding win, but Carrick was keen to focus on the character shown after Leif Davis’ early opener.
“The biggest pleasing thing for me was about dealing with setbacks, if you want to be a good team or a successful team,” Carrick said.
“Every team gets beat, or has to deal with setbacks in certain ways. We spoke about before the game to try and overcome last week, and we took a mini setback going a goal behind.
“The stubbornness, the belief, the confidence, the togetherness the boys showed at that stage was really pleasing for me. That mentality is what we relied on today.”
Fernandes inevitably dominated the post-match conversation, but Carrick was equally keen to highlight the performance of Kobbie Mainoo, who was outstanding in his first start of the season.
“I understand Bruno getting a lot of credit today, and he deserves that as well, but I thought Kobbie was immense in the middle of the pitch for us and underpinned the performance of the team,” he said. “On today’s performance, not much to improve. He was very, very good for a first start back.”
Fernandes given flowers
On Fernandes himself Carrick was equally direct. “It doesn’t surprise me. It’s just the kind of thing that gets labelled when you lose games.
“Just because you lose a game, it doesn’t mean everything’s wrong, or the wheels have come off, or they don’t want to play, or they’re not passionate or they’re not leaders. The best teams lose games of football. Together, the boys bounced back particularly well from different setbacks, and that will stand us in good stead moving forward.”
Marcus Rashford’s return to the starting line-up, his first Premier League start at Old Trafford in almost two years, also drew warm words from the United manager.
Rashford had been strongly linked with a move to Barcelona over the summer before remaining at the club. “He’s one of our own, he’s living his dream playing here now and trying to be successful and win,” Carrick said.
“I think there’s players that have gone and come back sometimes and maybe players that were going to leave but didn’t. It’s all about what you do next and what your intentions are, and he’s been fantastic since he came back. It was great to see him out on the pitch today.”
