Player of the Season Nominees: Michael Carrick

With the season having ended, Sportskeeda decided to let its viewers rate the 30 best players of the season.

We will be shortlisting 30 of the best performers this term, and let you pick your winner.

What do you think? Have your say at the end of the article.

Xabi Alonso: “In English football sometimes it seems hard for people to rate those who instead of shining themselves make the team work as a collective. For example Michael Carrick . . . who makes those around him play.”

The most demanding role on the field is the defensive midfield. There is a reason why they are sought after and Bayern broke the German transfer record to sign Javi Martinez, one of the most dominating midfielders in the world. When Jurgen Klopp tactically shut down Xabi Alonso with Gundogan, the Real Madrid team containing the likes of Ronaldo and Ozil struggled. But the same Dortmund team couldn’t neutralise the affect of Javi Martinez in the final.

Juventus has Pirlo while Barca has Busquets, who is the main reason the midfield trio can impose themselves in the game. And then Manchester United have Michael Carrick. In 2006, he was bought from Spurs for 18-mn as a replacement for the dynamic Roy Keane. He was neither as ferocious as Keane nor was he as imposing as Keane. But many failed to realize that Sir Alex had bought one of the most tactical and technical players in the world.

For long, he was under appreciated and was only criticised as lazy and not an able passer of the ball. But as the Scholes affect started to fade away, Carrick took the responsibility and reached the peak of his powers this season.

This Season

Some of the lazy narrative about Carrick is that he doesn’t pass forward enough or that he just plays five-to-ten yard passes. With respect to the former, 37% of his Premier League passes were forward this season while just 8% went backwards. He was the metronomial architect of a United side that lacked spark the previous season and lost the title.

While he was always excellent defensively, this season he stepped up to take the place of Paul Scholes and became the midfield orchestrator of the team. He controlled the tempo at which United played and his passing game was a level up from the previous years. While Robin Van Persie got the honours this season, it was Carrick who was the backbone of a team that won the league with 4 games to go.

His passing accuracy is up amongst the elite passers in Europe, like Xavi, Pirlo, Schweinstiger, Arteta. While Carrick has been criticised for lack of creativity in his passing, that has not been the case this season as he made some passes to Javier Hernandez against Newcastle and Chelsea, and many others to Robin Van Persie.

Coming to the defensive side of his game, he is a class above the rest. He neither goes in for rash tackles like Roy Keane nor does he terribly mistime his tackle like Scholes, but plays like Maldini. His positioning is perfect and he initiates counter attacks with consummate ease. He times his tackles perfectly and rarely gives away a foul. This can be warranted by the fact that he wins possession every 13 minutes and loses possession at an average of just once every two matches.

Another feature of Carrick’s game is his ability to adapt with anyone playing alongside him. Throughout the season, Sir Alex always rotated his midfielders around Carrick and he played equally well alongside everyone, like Cleverly, Scholes, Anderson, Rooney.

In a nutshell, he is Manchester United’s engine. Almost everything goes through him, whether he’s defending on the edge of his own box or threading balls through the opposition. He has become very good at flicking in corners with his head to his teammate.

In his seven seasons at Old Trafford, Carrick has never made less than 41 appearances in any campaign — and 44 were made for the 2012-13 one. His durability and stamina is incredible. With the Englishman at the peak of his powers right now, no other player is currently more reliable than him in this United squad. He is to Manchester United what Xavi is to Barcelona, what Pirlo is to Juventus. Pure class.

National team

In a country where Scholes was moved away from his position to accommodate Lampard and Gerrard, it is no surprise that Michael Carrick is yet to become an England regular at the age of 31. He is what England lacks, a player who is calm and composed on the ball and can hold possession, and also pick out the forward making the late run without shirking off his defensive responsibilities. But the English managers always picked the stars rather than the team players.

It is a well-known fact that Gerrard and Lampard do not gel together and that they would be overrun by pacy sides but the English managers seem to be unable to pick players who would make a balanced side. After a long time, Carrick is being recognised for his contribution, but still the managers seem reluctant to replace Gerrard with Carrick, who would make a wonderful duo alongside Jack Wilshere.

The only weakness that can be pointed out in Carrick’s game is his seemingly less number of goals. But he makes up for more than that with his all-round contribution to the game. The under-appreciated genius was nominated for the PFA player of the season award for the first time in his career and was voted the Manchester United Player’s player of the year. And that should tell you something about how highly his teammates rate him.