Mauricio Pochettino is about to sign Harry Kane and Cole Palmer for Manchester United – but only if they can overcome a ‘worrying omen’.

A Daily Mail journalist also believes he is alone in identifying Michael Carrick might not be any good.

It’s raining omen
Quite why Manchester United are apparently bothering to sack Michael Carrick and install a replacement is anyone’s guess, considering The Sun website have shed some light on the uphill battle they face this season:

‘The worrying omen that means Man Utd are doomed to be RELEGATED unless they dramatically beat the odds’

No point fighting against fate, lads. No amount of Best In Class can overcome an ‘omen’.

‘MANCHESTER United are in the relegation zone despite their late comeback draw against Aston Villa.

‘And recent Prem history suggests Old Trafford fans should be starting to get VERY worried about their side becoming the biggest fall guys since the League was established.’

Sod ‘recent Prem history’; Manchester United’s current form suggests fans ought to be quite concerned.

But we’re here now, so Martin Lipton absolutely must fill us in on this ‘worrying omen’ dooming Manchester United to relegation.

‘Michael Carrick’s side stand 18th in the table after their opening 10 games which have brought a solitary win, against Ipswich back in August.

‘But while the Old Trafford mood brightened after those stoppage time goals from Joshua Zirkzee and Patrick Dorgu, the omens are somewhat darker.’

We’re getting there…

‘Over the past five full seasons since the end of Covid, no fewer than 11 of the 15 sides in the bottom three after 10 games have ended up going down.’

Oh. It’s quite an underwhelming ‘omen’ in the grand scheme of things; teams that prove themselves to be sh*t after 10 games are generally still quite sh*t after 38.

The ‘omen’ is also wrong. No fewer than 10 of the 15 sides in the bottom three after 10 games have ended up going down. One member of the bottom three after 10 games has stayed up in each of those five seasons. And, in fact, the three seasons before that, back to 2017/18 when Everton, Bournemouth and Crystal Palace all survived being in the bottom three after 10 games.

And then there’s this…

‘Admittedly, United’s current eight point tally is more than any of those sides had amassed in their 10 matches, with the exception of Southampton in 2022-23.’

If anything, this all feels more like an omen that Manchester United will probably stay up.

Dream on
And of course, Mauricio Pochettino might be able to engineer a turnaround of sorts.

Especially if this Sun website dream XI comes true, with the emphasis entirely on ‘dream’. We’re a tad more realistic.

Among the most outlandish suggestions here is that ‘Lisandro Martinez could enjoy a redemption arc under compatriot Pochettino’. Which is saying something, because up front in this Pochettino XI is Harry Kane, with Cole Palmer behind him.

We also have Lewis Hall at left-back, Marquinhos at centre-half and Scott McTominay returning in midfield (he is mentioned nowhere in the article and just pops up randomly in the graphic), with the notoriously spendthrift Manchester United under combined Glazer and INEOS rule really splashing the cash.

That is, by the way, a striker, a 10, a midfielder and two defenders coming in. That’s four summers worth of recruitment for poor Jason Wilcox!

‘He wouldn’t come cheap, but the possibility of reuniting with Poch and having a chance to compete for honours, while also going for the all-time Prem goals record, may appeal.

‘Temptation to come back may grow if he manages to fulfil his dream of winning the Champions League with Bayern this term – and if United look like actually getting their act together.’

It definitely makes complete sense for Kane to leave Bayern after winning the Champions League so he has ‘a chance to compete for honours’ with Manchester United (who have won an FA Cup and League Cup in the last decade).

Good luck extracting Palmer from a 427-year contract, too.

Oh when the Saints
It would be fun to have Pochettino back in the Premier League.

He’s been Barclays-adjacent for a while, not that The Sun website knows it:

‘He has long spoken of his admiration for United and the achievement of Sir Alex Ferguson and has been regularly linked with the Old Trafford role even during his time at Spurs.

‘United made a tentative approach when he was at PSG and then in 2022 Pochettino was edged out in a head to head with Erik ten Hag.

‘A year later, he was appointed at Chelsea but left Stamford Bridge after just one season following disputes with the Blues board.

‘Now though, he could be tempted to take charge of a third Prem club if United do want to offer him the chance.’

He could take over ‘a third Prem club’, eh? Poor Southampton.

The Luck of the draw
This, in all fairness, is an exceptional aside from Samuel Luckhurst in The Sun:

‘The substitution of Dalot against Villa was loudly cheered and the Portuguese was booed as he jogged off the pitch. Mazraoui, who had tights on again against Villa, is suffering a raging World Cup hangover.’

It feels like Mazraoui’s sartorial choices are about to receive as much entirely irrelevant long-read infamy as Matteo Darmian’s inability to boil eggs.

Are you saying ‘boo’ or ‘boo-alot’?
Writes Ian Ladyman on Diogo Dalot in the Daily Mail:

‘The 27-year-old was bought for his teenage potential by his compatriot Jose Mourinho in 2018 but has never trained on. He has never been good enough for a really top English club yet has made more than 250 appearances for the most famous one of all and has played for five different permanent managers.

‘On Sunday he was booed off by his own supporters when substituted after an hour. His had been a particularly grim performance but the boos were not about him, not really.’

Feels like they might have been a little bit about Dalot, the only player who was booed at any point before, during or after the game.

‘No they were not about Dalot but instead about the fundamental truth of what he represents. Namely a steady, grisly and unforgivable drain of footballing standards at United that actually began in the final days of Sir Alex Ferguson and has subsequently never stopped.’

That too, granted. But the boos he and he alone received were definitely also about him quite a bit.

Dublin up
Ladyman, elsewhere in the Daily Mail is positively bemused by Dion Dublin saying Carrick has done enough to keep his job, as if he is the first pundit ever to be reluctant to actively advocate for a manager’s sacking.

But this is wonderful:

‘His team are a shambles and that’s on him. Once again, this is a mediocre league and it’s quite criminal that Carrick has his group of players in the bottom three.

‘The former Middlesbrough manager is so out of his depth it’s quite painful to watch.

‘Why does nobody else seem to see that?’

Yes, Ian, you are the one person who has noticed that Michael Carrick might not be a suitable Manchester United manager. A gold star for you.

Lip service
‘Man City’s players are crumbling under the guilt of £1billion financial ‘sham’ – even footballers don’t live in a vacuum’ is also remarkable nonsense from Lipton, back over at The Sun.

Are these individual Manchester City mistakes leading to the regular concession of goals really the manifestation of ‘guilt’? And not the fact they have a new coach for the first time in a decade, with an entirely new midfield?

‘It is, surely, no real surprise City’s worst league run in two seasons comes as the initial internal sense of anger and indignation over the independent commission’s guilty verdict on the financial charges has been replaced by a realisation of what is hanging over the club.’

How many different ways of phrasing ‘City’s worst league run in two seasons’ do we think Lipton brainstormed before deciding that was the best way of catastrophising it? Really doesn’t sound all that bad, does it?

And if ‘guilt’ is the main cause of City losing three games in a row in November 2026, how does Lipton draw a correlation between that and losing four consecutively in December 2024? Well…

‘Indeed, the last time they lost three on the bounce came two years ago – just as the hearing that eventually resulted in the ruling was getting started.’

That’s definitely it. They’ve lost three in a row now because of ‘guilt’, and four in a row two years ago because the hearing had started. Not sure how they won quite a few games and an actual trophy in between.