Carrick dismisses 'lazy' passion criticism after Manchester United's opening-day loss at Hull

Michael Carrick has gone on the offensive after Manchester United’s opening-day defeat at Hull City, branding accusations that his side lacked passion at the MKM Stadium as “lazy” and “ridiculous” in his pre-match press conference ahead of Sunday’s fixture against Ipswich.

The United head coach was particularly stung by a question from former Premier League striker Jan Aage Fjortoft over whether his players had shown sufficient desire in the loss, which he dismissed outright. Carrick argued that reducing a defeat to a simple question of passion ignored the tactical and situational factors that shaped the result.

“Teams lose games, so there’s different reasons,” Carrick said. “I think it’s so easy and lazy to just — team loses a game, everything’s wrong. This is wrong, this is wrong, not trying enough, not enough passion. It’s just like the obvious answer.”

Carrick, who has been in charge at Old Trafford since January, pointed to two conceded set-pieces as the decisive moments in the defeat and cautioned against reading too much into a single result. “It’s one game. You lose two set-plays like we did, changes the game,” he said.

The 45-year-old also highlighted the inconsistency in how performances are judged depending on the result, suggesting that United have played similarly in games they have won without attracting the same scrutiny. “We’ve probably played like that and won games, and everyone goes, ‘What a great team, what a great coach, what a great load of players,’ when we find a way to win 1-0,” he said.

Despite the public defiance, Carrick acknowledged that his coaching staff had spent the week analysing what went wrong against Hull and identified areas where the squad can be sharper. He insisted the dressing room has sufficient leadership to respond, while urging those outside the club not to overreact to the shock result.

“We know what we’re trying to improve on,” he said. “There’s certainly things that we can be a little bit clearer on, and calmer on in certain moments.”

United face another newly-promoted side in Ipswich on Sunday, making the fixture a significant early test of whether Carrick’s side can bounce back from a chastening start to the Championship season.