Carrick plays down Shaw injury scare as United's left-back gap looms large

Luke Shaw sat out Manchester United’s training session on Wednesday, heightening scrutiny over the club’s failure to sign a left-back cover in the summer, with the Champions League opener against Azerbaijani side Sabah at Old Trafford arriving on Thursday night.

Manager Michael Carrick moved quickly to calm concerns in his pre-match press conference, describing the absence as a managed rest day rather than a sign of anything more serious. “We just gave him an extra recovery day today,” Carrick said. “We’ll see by tomorrow how he is, but it’s not an ongoing thing or a plan or anything like that. It was just off the back of the game the other day.”

The episode nonetheless underlines the risk United accepted by entering the season without specialist cover for the 31-year-old. The club had targeted Newcastle’s Lewis Hall during the transfer window but were unable to secure a deal, leaving Shaw as the only senior specialist left-back in the squad. When Shaw was substituted in last weekend’s 2-2 draw with Everton, it was right-back Noussair Mazraoui who stepped in, with Patrick Dorgu and Diogo Dalot the other available alternatives.

Academy left-back Harry Amass is not part of the first-team squad, meaning the depth issue is genuine rather than theoretical. United face a particularly compressed run of fixtures, with the Manchester Derby against City following on Sunday — less than 72 hours after the Sabah game.

Carrick acknowledged the schedule but declined to treat it as an excuse. “I’m not concerned,” he said. “It’s not ideal, but it’s not something we can do much about. We’ve got to deal with the cards we were dealt.” On rotation for the Sabah fixture, he added: “It’s a balanced view, that’s why we’ve got the squad. We need to adapt to certain strengths and different ways of playing. It’s about managing the group and trusting them — anyone who can play will play.”

There was more encouraging news elsewhere in defence, with Matthias de Ligt returning to training after back surgery in May kept him sidelined since the end of November. “Matta has trained really well,” Carrick said. “When you’re out for such a long period of time and you get right to the final stages, you’ve got to manage it” — though the Dutchman’s match readiness remains unclear ahead of Thursday.