Manchester United have said goodbye to the short but eventful Michael Carrick era.
The interim manager to the interim manager had an unbeaten run, beating Villarreal and Arsenal while also drawing with Chelsea at Stamford Bridge.
Carrick secured United’s top spot in their UEFA Champions League group, finally beat Mikel Arteta and the bogey team that has been Arsenal over recent years and held the Premier League leaders at bay. Not bad.
However, another achievement Carrick managed in his one week run was to unearth a gem who will only thrive going forward under Ralf Rangnick.
The achievement in question is the Brazilian midfielder and once polarising United player; Fred.
Fred, to many fans, has been seen as an unremarkable player since joining United in 2018 from Shakhtar Donetsk.
However, Fred never genuinely played his natural role under Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. Fred would regularly be played as the deepest midfielder in the double pivot, essentially being United’s defensive midfielder.
Fred being asked to play deeper took away arguably his best traits. His ability to constantly harass every opposition midfielder without worrying about his position was severely hindered. Not to mention his knack for playing a killer pass into the final third wasn’t as prominent when he had to play deeper.
Under Michael Carrick's short interim run, we saw a Fred we’ve seen for the Brazilian national team. Being given the freedom to play higher up the pitch, more as a traditional box-to-box midfielder, Fred has thrived.
Two assists against Arsenal came for the Brazilian and he arguably should’ve had one against Villarreal as well. The moment in question was when he harassed the Villarreal defender into passing the ball back to the goalkeeper slowly, allowing Cristiano Ronaldo to pounce and slot the ball home.
Those were his first assists of the season, and with his combined Manchester United assist tally now being at ten, a 20% improvement is insane due to a tiny tweak made by Carrick.
Fred won’t be asked to create many goals and assists, but Ralf Rangnick has had much success with players cut from the same cloth while managing RB Leipzig.
Naby Keita is easily the best comparison. A hard-working, harassing midfielder who could dribble with the best of them and had a similar knack for playing a killer pass. Even though Rangnick never personally managed Keita, he was the man behind bringing him to both RB Salzburg and RB Leipzig, commanding £54 million off Liverpool for his services.
Marcel Sabitzer could also be an apt comparison. In Rangnick’s season managing RB Leipzig in 2018/19, Sabitzer got five goals and six assists. Not numbers that jump off the screen, but significant numbers for a midfielder who wasn’t tasked in scoring a bucket load of goals.
With Fred, we’ve seen he can make that pass. People joke about his long-range shooting, but his goalscoring efforts weren’t too bad back in Ukraine. Five of his 15 goals at Shakhtar came from outside the box, with the other ten being goals after he arrived late into the box.
With the complete trust of a manager like Rangnick, who will play him in his natural position, it shouldn’t be out of the question that Fred could replicate his goalscoring and passing ways once again.
How do you think Fred will fare under Ralf Rangnick? Follow our United On My Mind editor Mike Parrott on Twitter to get involved in the discussion and give us your thoughts in the comment section below.
