Benjamin Sesko seemed to be the big loser of Michael Carrick's new look Man United - but coach can help striker's career take off after miserable spell under Ruben Amorim

Michael Carrick’s first game back in charge of Manchester United was a euphoric occasion, with his side’s dominant win over Manchester City bringing a smile to every person present at Old Trafford. Well, almost every person. Benjamin Sesko did not get on the pitch during the 2-0 win, raising questions about his place in Carrick’s thoughts and his team for the rest of the season.

Sesko has had a difficult spell since joining as the club’s biggest signing of the summer following his $100m move from RB Leipzig, struggling to adapt to the pace of the Premier League and then being forced out injured for a month. He was just starting to find form under caretaker coach Darren Fletcher, scoring three times in the games against Burnley and Brighton.

But instead of being asked to take the next step in the derby, he was dropped from the starting lineup as Carrick preferred Bryan Mbeumo to play as a centre-forward rather than out wide as he did under Ruben Amorim and for most of his time at Brentford. And when Mbeumo came off, Carrick turned to Matheus Cunha rather than the Slovenian.

It did not say much for the new coach’s confidence in Sesko. However, Carrick's careful treatment of the striker suggests a big change from the way Amorim handled him and could be the key to getting the most out of him...

Arm around the shoulder

While it would have been natural for Carrick to salute his top-performing players after the derby such as Mbeumo and Bruno Fernandes, instead he sought out Sesko at full-time, putting his around the player. He seemed to be telling the striker not to worry, that he would soon get to form part of this project and be involved in other resounding wins at Old Trafford soon enough.

And when it was put to Carrick that Sesko was not able to build on the momentum he had gained in the previous two games, the coach was quick to set the record straight. "I don’t think it’s losing momentum," he said. "It was a team for last week to go into the game in a certain way. I think he’s in a good place Ben, he’s trained really well. Obviously, we’re working with him and trying to improve him as much as possible.

"I’ve been really impressed with the way he’s trained, his finishing and the way he’s gone about it. I don’t see it as anything else other than pushing on and using what he’s just done over the last month or so as a stepping stone and being here for a long time."

'In a good place'

Although we will have to wait until the line-ups drop for Sunday's visit to Arsenal to find out if he was telling the truth, Carrick was keen to point out that he picked the team he did against City to suit the opponent, lifting Sesko's hopes of starting at the Emirates Stadium or getting a decent chunk of minutes off the bench.

"It’s just variety in terms of the strengths [of each player]. I think, Bryan, I gave him a bit of a free role in many ways in a partnership with Bruno last week, to drift and to fill different spaces. Ben’s very good at playing on the last line and running behind and I think we’ve seen that in recent weeks, he’s done great to get his goal so he’s in a good place.

"Matheus came on through the middle and made a big difference for us in terms of carrying the game into the later stages and creating the second goal, so we’ve got good options through there and we just felt, last week, that was the way to go and, thankfully, it paid off for us."

Carrick wants to 'improve individuals'

In his first press conference since returning as United coach last week, Carrick said that improving individual players was among his main objectives and something he would use to measure whether or not his time in charge would be a success. He explained: "I think a big part of what I really enjoy is improving individuals and, in the end, I think if you improve the individuals, we create a better team."

And if there is a player he needs to help improve more than anyone else, it is Sesko. The Slovenian has had a lot of hype around him since he was a teenager. Indeed, United were interested in signing him when he was 16 before he opted to join RB Salzburg instead. His Salzburg connections led to inevitable comparisons with Erling Haaland, who also moved from the Austrian top flight to the Bundesliga.

But Sesko's career has not witnessed the lightning-quick progression of the Norwegian superstar, with him doing well at RB Leipzig but not exactly setting the league on fire, posting 14 goals in his first season and 13 in his second. Haaland, by contrast, scored 13 times in half a season with Borussia Dortmund, banging in 27 in his first full campaign and then 22 in his last, which was interrupted by injuries.

Rough start

Sesko's lack of Premier League experience and underwhelming goal numbers led to some concern that he was not much of an upgrade on Rasmus Hojlund and those fears were realised in his first few weeks, as the striker was met with the twin realities of how tough the Premier League is for new strikers and with how big the spotlight is at United.

Amorim seemed wary of that and was reluctant to play him too early. He didn't start him against Arsenal or Fulham and although he got 90 minutes against Grimsby, eyebrows were raised when it emerged he was the team's 10th penalty taker in the shootout, behind every player except Andre Onana. Sesko was again a substitute for the next game against Burnley, with Amorim revealing he had suffered from cramp after the Grimsby game and suggesting it would have been a risk to start him.

Sesko scored for the first time against Brentford and followed it up with a goal against Sunderland the following week. But in his next match against Liverpool he was back on the bench. He returned to the starting line-up against Brighton and Nottingham Forest, struggling in particular in the latter game and receiving fierce criticism from Gary Neville.

"He's miles off it compared to the other forwards United brought in, like Cunha and Mbeumo," Neville said. "He looks awkward; his touch was off a few times when balls went over the top. For €80m (£73.7m), yes, he's young and still settling, but you want to see something more."

Amorim's tough love didn't work

Amorim sought to defend Sesko when speaking about him a few days later but instead, in his typical, brutally honest way, he sounded like he too was criticising the player. He said: "When I started training with Ben, he had more potential than I was thinking. He’s going to struggle, and we need to understand how he likes to play, and also to put in our ideas.

"He has no experience here, and then the first impact when everyone says that you are so good, you are the next big thing – and you hear about that with Sesko – and then you come to one club that is the hardest club.

"If you don't perform every week, you are going to hear a lot of things from club legends, from pundits, from the media - and sometimes they are right. Of course, nobody likes to hear, but he struggled a little bit, and that is a fact. So, let's embrace that. Ben is a young kid, a control freak. He wants to control everything - and he's not going to control everything."

Amorim's tough love approach with Sesko did not really yield results, although he had the misfortune to injure his knee in his very next game against Tottenham.

Personal touch can pay off

He started four games in a row when he returned but failed to score and Amorim's tactics, asking him to hold the ball up and flick it on for his fellow forwards, did not seem to help.

He missed a slew of good chances in Amorim's final game at Leeds and by the end looked on a completely different page to his team-mates. Fletcher made a point of talking to the striker in detail about his movement before the next game against Burnley and it paid dividends, with Sesko scoring twice and having eight shots. Carrick needs to follow a similar strategy, focusing on how to get the best out of the striker and play to his strengths rather than trying to crowbar him into a certain system.

Despite not playing Sesko in his first match, Carrick has made it clear that the striker will be a big part of his plans moving forward. Only time will tell whether it pays off, but he has already shown a more personal touch than his predecessor.