Carragher clarifies his Liverpool ownership criticism after blasting Martinez's Wilcox attack

Jamie Carragher has drawn a sharp distinction between his own past criticism of Liverpool’s former owners and Lisandro Martinez’s public attack on Manchester United’s director of football Jason Wilcox, insisting the two situations are not comparable.

Martinez sparked controversy after United’s Champions League defeat to Atletico Madrid when he called out Wilcox by name, saying he expected “more” from the club’s technical director following a summer window that left the squad short. With Luke Shaw injured, teenager Ayden Heaven was forced to fill in at left-back. Martinez told Amazon Prime Video: “I expect more from our technical director. I have to be honest — as players we have to do more, but it is also important when you make a strong squad to be ready for this kind of night.”

While United supporters largely backed their defender, former Liverpool centre-back Carragher was among the ex-professionals who criticised the outburst. That prompted reminders that Carragher himself had publicly condemned Liverpool’s American owners, Tom Hicks and George Gillett Jr, during their troubled tenure between 2007 and 2010.

Writing in his column for The Telegraph, Carragher explained why he believes the two cases are entirely different. “My comments were in an autobiography, when I chose to be candid about an ongoing ‘civil war’ between Champions League-winning manager Rafa Benítez and the hierarchy,” he wrote. “That was in an era when my club faced an existential threat with Liverpool loaded with debt, and a promise broken to put ‘a spade in the ground within 60 days’ to build a new stadium.”

Carragher, who was Liverpool’s vice-captain at the time, argued that staying silent on such matters would have been irresponsible. “As a local player and Liverpool’s vice-captain, failure to address this topic would have been negligent,” he wrote. “If Martinez was speaking about how the Glazers exploited United for their own profit, he would have my backing. You cannot equate my remarks in 2008 with someone throwing an executive under the bus for failing to sign a few players.”

The 48-year-old’s intervention underlines the broader debate around when, and how, players should air grievances about club management in public — and whether the target and the stakes make all the difference.