Michael Carrick has told his Manchester United players to put their derby disappointment behind them quickly despite feeling frustration that Erling Haaland‘s winner for Manchester City was allowed to stand.
Referees body Pro Ref was forced to admit an “error of judgement” on Sunday night after City’s goal was given, despite Enzo Fernández appearing to interfere with play from an offside position.
Lisandro Martínez branded the decision “an injustice.”
But while Carrick agreed with Martinez, he also called on his team to “move on” with a Carabao Cup tie against Brighton to come on Wednesday and a trip to Fulham in the Premier League on Sunday.
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“We’ve got two games coming up this week, and it’s part of it, moving on quickly,” Carrick said.
“We haven’t got as many points as we would have liked at this point, for sure. There’s no getting away from that. But we don’t need [the international] break or a restart. We’ve just got to move on and get winning again.”
Carrick managed to stay relatively calm during his post-match interviews saying only that the error was “obvious.”
However, sources have told ESPN that United’s head coach was only fully aware of the extent of the mistake until later in the evening.
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Carrick only had a short time between full-time and the start of his media commitments.
And according to sources, it wasn’t until after the end of his post-match news conference that Carrick was fully briefed that the correct processes had not been followed by the officials.
The statement from Pro Ref acknowledging the mistake was issued around three hours after full-time.
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Speaking before the statement was published, Carrick said: “It’s a major impact on the game, and it was a massive game, but there’s a long season ahead.
“We’ve got to get back to winning football matches. That’s on us, but that decision, that wasn’t on us. It’s up to us to then create and score after that. Of course it is. We had moments. It’s not easy but it’s up to us to do that.
“We’ll move on and learn from it. But we’re not moving on lightly. We’ve got to get back to winning as a team.”
