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Michael Carrick refused to name Manchester United's inability to sufficiently bolster his squad during the summer as a contributing factor to the team's disappointing performances. Lisandro Martinez criticised the club's hierarchy following United's defeat to Atletico Madrid in the Champions League earlier this month, stating he "expected more" from United in the summer transfer market.
United currently face an extensive injury crisis - nine senior players were absent from the midweek defeat at Como - but the deficiencies in the squad have been laid bare over recent weeks, with Carrick deploying players in unfamiliar positions.
United supporters have urged Carrick to speak candidly about the club's £150million expenditure in the summer transfer window, which was surpassed by the Red Devils' rivals. However, the 44-year-old has declined to rock the boat by suggesting he should have received greater backing.
When questioned whether he would acknowledge that insufficient signings during the summer have contributed to the poor results, Carrick replied: "I think there's a lot of elements, different elements, some smaller than others, of why we've ended up not winning as many games. So, I'm pretty clear about that."
Carrick was questioned whether the board had admitted that he should have been afforded more support in the window. "It's not about receiving more support, it's about doing what's right on the football pitch to get results, and we haven't done enough of that lately," he said.
Among the criticisms levelled at Carrick's side is a perceived absence of intensity. United sit rock bottom of the crucial running metrics, and the players appeared sluggish once more throughout the mauling by Como.
"I think you've got to be careful with just saying 'not running'," said Carrick. "As I said we've won a lot of games over a period of time and this pressing thing, that suddenly everyone thinks about pressing.
"Pressing is one small part of football. There's all sorts of different ways of what people are classed as a press. What actually is it? What you're doing it for? Is it to your strength? Is it covering up other spaces? It's just thrown about as a bit of a word at the minute of pressing. You don't necessarily need to press to win games of football.
"Sometimes you do, sometimes you don't. It's just a thing that gets thrown about. So we've got to be a bit careful with that. As I say, it's not necessarily just running stats that define football games either.
"So we've just got to get back to doing a lot of the things that we were doing last season and for certain parts of this season and certain games we've been okay. We need to get back to being at our best."
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