Man Utd co-owners meet at Carrington as Michael Carrick prepares for first match

Manchester United co-owners Sir Jim Ratcliffe, Joel Glazer and Avram Glazer met at Carrington on Thursday as Michael Carrick gears up to face Manchester City in his first match as head coach.

Ruben Amorim’s sacking last week – after 14 underwhelming and increasingly acrimonious months – saw Darren Fletcher temporarily parachuted in before another ex-Red Devils midfielder took the reins.

Carrick was named United boss for the remainder of the season on Tuesday and two days later, Ratcliffe was in town along with Joel and Avram Glazer for a scheduled executive committee meeting.

The Press Association understands the club moved it to Manchester to ensure leadership were onsite to support the new manager and minimise disruption ahead of his first game in charge.

The trio arrived on the back of fraught fortnight at United as anger bubbles within the fanbase, with The 1958 group planning a protest against the ownership ahead of the Premier League home match against Fulham on February 1.

Saturday lunchtime’s Manchester derby against City at Old Trafford comes first and a trip to Arsenal, providing Carrick with an unenviable start to a job that former team-mate Gary Neville does not believe should extend beyond this season.

“I hope he does really well,” Neville said. “There cannot be any consideration that Michael takes the job beyond this season, for Michael and for the club.

“If he wins every game, look, we could be sat here in the season where he’s done unbelievably well, and we’re always thinking the fans are up and they’re in the Champions League places, fifth or whatever. It could happen if there’s a good run and we could all be getting swayed with it.

Michael Carrick is back