Gery Neville and Jamie Carragher lock horns in heated exchange over Man United's 3-0 loss to Liverpool

Ex-Liverpool defender Jamie Carragher and treble-winning ex-United players Gary Neville and Roy Keane put their heads together in a debate over Manchester United’s humiliating 3-0 defeat to Liverpool on Sky’s Super Sunday programme, with bold predictions made over the manager’s future - and disagreement between Neville and Carragher over the club’s decision to keep Erik ten Hag in charge.

Carragher, who played more than 700 times for the Merseyside club, laid into United’s manager Ten Hag for what he saw as a lack of strategy after newcomer Arne Slot’s side demolished them 3-0.

“Jason Wilcox [United’s technical director] I think made a statement last season about a philosophy of play - there isn’t one. We can see it with Slot in the first three games. Now that doesn’t mean it’s going to be successful, there’s different ways of playing, but you can already see something, the way they try and play, the profile of players that they’re looking for. With Man United it just looks a mess.

“The manager’s the main man. He dictates what goes on here, not coaches. His philosophy of play, how he wants to play… Erik ten Hag said in his interview ‘we’ll see where we are at the end of the season’ - and yeah, it’s early days, it’s three games - [but] I’d be surprised if he was still in charge at the end of the season.”

When asked for his views, Neville said: “He [Carragher] used 'bottle' up on the gantry and that is why we were arguing for 20 minutes - he said that the ownership bottled it in not getting rid of him.

“Oh my god! How can you say they bottled it? They were really open about the fact that they went and looked for a manager to try and replace Erik ten Hag, they couldn't find one. Bayern Munich had a few months to replace [Thomas] Tuchel, and found it difficult and ended up employing someone that was third and fourth choice (Vincent Kompany). Liverpool had six months to replace Klopp and Arne Slot was third choice... it wasn't easy to get a manager in at the end of last season for Manchester United or any club in Europe."

Carragher asked: "So you are openly admitting that they were looking for another manager?" Neville, growing frustrated, replied: "You just said it! They admitted it. What are you on about?"

Carragher responded: "So they are looking for someone else, so they don't want this manager. If you’re happy with your manager, you don't start speaking to other managers.”

To which Neville said: “Erik Ten Hag wins the FA Cup and I think it shocks everybody. It shocks Ineos and they then think well okay… we'll still go and look around Europe and see if we can find a manager. They couldn't find a manager that they felt would take the club forward at this moment in time better than Erik ten Hag could so he kept his job Liverpool couldn't find the manager first, second, and third time - neither could Bayern Munich. It was hard to find managers last at the end of last season; a lot of clubs in Europe were trying to look for a manager and couldn't find one. Ineos tried to look for one to replace Erik ten Hag, they couldn't do, so they decided because he won the FA Cup they would stick with him - what part of that don't you understand?”

Neville also disagreed with his former teammate Roy Keane over where things went wrong for United on the pitch. Individuals giving up possession led to all three of Liverpool’s goals - twice the culprit was Casemiro, once Kobbie Mainoo - when questioned about whether it was a ‘setup issue’ for United, Neville disagreed.

“They're individual errors that basically are in terrible areas. When we played at United, me and Dennis Irwin would go forward and leave our two centre-backs opn the ball with Roy Keane or Paul Scholes - and if they gave the ball away, we’d be in a bit of trouble, but they didn’t do it that often.”

Keane weighed in to counter his colleague, though: “At this level they [Mainoo and Casemiro] are expected to do better. But it still shouldn’t be as simple as one mistake like that - that one pass, somebody’s in on goal, I don’t think it should be as simple as that, but it is.

“If you’re a full back and you see your midfield getting it, you should always be expecting the worst, going, ‘He might lose it here!’ But the two of them are out of the picture. As a defender we always say expect the worst. Expect your mate to lose it. But they’re running back in, they’re on the outside looking in, they should be back inside.”

United will now have a much-needed international break to regroup as they look to right the wrongs that have seen them lose two of their three opening games, and will then face Southampton - yet to record a single point - on September 14.