This Man United official is “seen as an embarrassment”, he has made the club “look like a joke” in the market

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We are only six games into the new season and Manchester United are already in the midst of a full-blown crisis.

Defeats against Hull City, the ten men of Manchester City, and their Carabao Cup exit at the hands of Brighton & Hove Albion have meant Michael Carrick is under enormous pressure.

Underlying statistics have shown that the former United midfielder is struggling to replicate the form that saw him get the permanent Old Trafford gig in the first place.

INEOS are reportedly doing their due diligence in case the team fail to overcome the Fulham hurdle on Sunday, but it is not only the head coach who has got it all wrong so far this season.

Carrick is getting all the criticism, but INEOS deserve it more

The co-owners should have backed Carrick to the hilt after he guided the Red Devils back into the Champions League after a two-year hiatus.

None of them arrived as the club thinktank sought to save money by not paying over the odds. And while Youri Tielemans is impressing, the 20-time English league champions needed far greater quality, especially at the back.

On top of that, they failed to get rid of any of the deadwood, which meant key positions up front and out wide were also ignored.

Matt Hargreaves has proved to be an embarrassment

As the reliable Sully pointed out, morale within the club is at an all-time low, with workers and fans let down by INEOS’ handling of affairs.

Matt Hargreaves, appointed as the club’s director of football negotiations, has been a failure for quite some time now.

The word from inside the club is that he is seen as an abject failure for his reluctance to spend big before eventually succumbing under pressure.

He has dragged negotiations on needlessly, resulting in the Old Trafford side missing out on Mateus Fernandes in the summer. Also, his failure to sell a single high-profile star was damning, to say the least.

INEOS’ best-in-class claims do not tally up

“One person who is barely mentioned in the media but is a massive problem is Matt Hargreaves – United’s director of football negotiations. Roundtable understands that Hargreaves is seen as an embarrassment internally at United by many figures and someone who isn’t fit for the job.

“Hargreaves has made United look like a joke in the transfer market. The constant long negotiations to end up paying the exact value of a player which the selling club always wanted, overpaying for players above their market value and the incompetency in selling players.

“All of these were evident in this transfer window: United practically sold 0 senior players; they were willing to overpay for Mateus Fernandes after months of negotiating, and they didn’t sign a left back, which was a priority position for the club.”

Yet he still remains in the job while Carrick is having to bear the brunt of all the toxicity. Interestingly, Hargreaves was a marketing director for Adidas before he took over from Matt Judge.

Credentials like these definitely do not support the notion that INEOS have recruited the best-in-class people to oversee operations at the club.