Manchester United's Defensive Woes Under Scrutiny

Manchester United’s soft centre is back under the microscope – and this time, Danny Simpson is not dressing it up.

United may have dragged themselves to third place last season and booked a Champions League return, but the numbers behind that finish still sting. Fifty goals conceded in 38 league games. Arsenal, the champions, let in almost half that. The warning lights flashed then. They’re blaring now.

Carrick’s side went into the 2026 summer window knowing where the damage had been done. The back line had creaked all year. Yet the money went elsewhere. First the attack was refreshed, then the midfield. The defence, again, was told to cope. Four games into the new Premier League campaign, United have just four points and not a single clean sheet to show for it.

Hull put two past them. Ipswich scored twice at Old Trafford. Everton found a way through as well. Then came the derby, and with it Erling Haaland’s controversial winner for City on United’s own pitch. Different opponents, same story. The questions over recruitment are getting louder.

“You need a set back four”

Simpson, a former United full-back who knows the demands of the club and the league, sees a problem that has been allowed to fester. Speaking to GOAL on behalf of Free Bets, he did not sugar-coat the situation.

“They're conceding too many goals,” he said. “Yes, we're good going forward though, most of the time. But I think it was well documented that we needed a left-back with Luke [Shaw]. Even though Luke was fantastic last season, I think everyone knows Luke can't play two games a week. We want to be in all the competitions. So there's now eight games in the Champions League, and you want to go far in the cups.”

That left side has been patched up with Patrick Dorgu. The youngster has been asked to drop in at left-back, including in the weekend defeat to City. Simpson likes what Dorgu showed last season in a more advanced role before injury – a “decent threat” higher up – but at the back, he sees a different picture.

At centre-half, he is clearer. “Centre-back? I think Harry [Maguire] and [Lisandro] Martinez are the two.” There, at least, he sees a partnership. Around them, the uncertainty grows.

“I do worry about full-backs,” Simpson admitted. “I think the inconsistency – one week it's [Noussair] Mazraoui, then it's [Diogo] Dalot, then one week they are an eight, next week they are five. I don't think anyone in any league, whether you're playing in the Premier League, the Champions League, trying to do well, you can't have players in your defence that are one week doing eight and the next week five.”

Attackers can ride those swings. Defenders cannot. That is Simpson’s point.

“I think up top you can, because if you've got a winger that's playing a five, you're going to change him and he normally gets swapped after six or seven. You can't do that with your defence. You need a set back four that's a seven every week. And then if they're not playing, who comes in?”

Right now, United’s answer is muddled. They have bodies. They do not yet have a settled line.

Yoro under the spotlight

One of those still under scrutiny is Yoro. The centre-back arrived from Lille in 2024, a highly rated prospect, raw but gifted. He is only 20 and has already made 69 appearances for United, a significant number for a defender of his age. The club have clearly trusted him. Simpson is not convinced the development has followed.

“Yoro hasn't kicked on at all,” he said. “He's been here two years now? You look at everything, when he came in he was young and slight, why is he not in the gym? Why has he not got any bigger? Why is he not stronger? He doesn't look like he's done anything in two years in terms of his physique. You know the Premier League is tough.”

That criticism cuts to the heart of the Premier League’s demands. Technique is not enough. Talent is not enough. Simpson is questioning the evolution of a player who was supposed to grow into a cornerstone of this defence.

He is not the only one in the frame. “Dalot's injured,” Simpson pointed out. “[Ayden] Heaven, we haven't seen him since the Hull game, not surprised, probably the wrong game for him to play in. Hull away in the start of the season against Oliver McBurnie, probably not the best.”

A young defender thrown into a physical away assignment, then quickly withdrawn from the picture. Another sign of a back line still being shuffled, still searching for balance, still without that “seven out of ten every week” reliability Simpson demands.

Strip it all back and his preferred unit is brutally simple. “So, your back four is your back four – which is Shaw, Martinez, Maguire and Dalot.”

That is the spine he believes Carrick must lean on, fitness permitting. The rest is noise. The rest is risk.

United have already paid for that risk in goals and points. With Champions League nights looming and domestic cups on the horizon, the next few weeks will reveal whether this defence can finally harden – or whether the season unravels on the same old fault line.