Michael Carrick walked into Monday's press conference with United 17th, above the drop zone on goal difference alone, with two wins from 13 in all competitions. He walked out saying he "can't wait" for Roma in the Champions League at Old Trafford on Tuesday night. Manchester United fan YouTubers were rather less excited.
The backdrop is Saturday's 2-0 defeat at Chelsea, with Lisandro Martinez sent off, and a weekend of reporting, The Athletic's David Ornstein included, that the club will stick with Carrick for Roma and Aston Villa and look at the job again over the international break. So the press conference was less a preview than a holding statement with injury news.
Carrick: the presser the channels called soft
Webby & O'Neill called it one of the softest press conferences they had seen. Nothing on the defence, nothing on who comes in, and nobody in the room pushing for one. Carrick said the dressing room was "a good place" and that Martinez's commitment was not an issue. The room's verdict: he is holding the umbrella over the players again and getting soaked. They also reckoned bringing Kobbie Mainoo along steered things towards history and nostalgia. "I'm not listening to nostalgia at the moment. I want to know what they're going to do."
Mainoo: one win away?
UnitedStand liked Mainoo more than his manager but would not buy his big line, that United feel one win away from changing their situation. The case against: two decent halves all season, Ipswich after the break and Chelsea before it, and "we've not seen a good 90 minutes of football" with November already here. He also went through the injury news. Luke Shaw is out all week, Marcus Rashford is day to day, and Patrick Dorgu is back in training but not ready for Roma. He is still going tomorrow, mind. Still a sliver of hope.
The board: business as usual
UnitedViewTV opened the morning show with "business as usual" and kept coming back to it like a sore tooth. Ornstein's line is that the club watched the players' reaction after the Bournemouth defeat and decided to give Carrick a chance. The room's read: either the board believe that, or sacking a third head coach means admitting it has gone wrong again. Out came the cowboy builder: the man who built it shaking his head at it, then getting the job to knock it down. They were fair to Carrick, too. Not doing well enough, they said, but not a man who will walk away from a club he loves.
Stretford Paddock's Jay did the paper round from outside Old Trafford. The papers agree Carrick gets Roma and Villa, then a decision in the break, with Eddie Howe and Julian Nagelsmann the names doing the rounds. He would love Carrick to turn it round. He would love Jason Wilcox gone even more, and spent a good chunk of the video explaining why, at volume.
UnitedCommunity went live on the same story under a title that does the job on its own: "ABSOLUTELY NO PLAN!" No captions on that one, so no quotes here, but the chat was not there to discuss the 4-2-3-1.
Roma: the bit with actual football
Somewhere under all this there is a Champions League game. Asked about Roma, Carrick went back to the 7-1 in 2007, when he scored twice: "a magical night". Nobody on these channels is asking for seven. One would do, and ideally without anyone being sent off.
That is the real split. Carrick is talking about the next 90 minutes because that is all he has been given. The channels are talking about the international break because they think that is when this actually gets decided. Win on Tuesday and Mainoo looks right for a week. Lose, and nobody will remember what the press conference was about.