After being knocked out of the Champions League at the quarter-final stage, Manchester United will be looking forward to finish the season strongly according to midfielder Michael Carrick. He has been one of the few players to have come out of the season with some credibility, as the club has performed very poorly this season.
They were expected to struggle after the arrival of a new manager – David Moyes, but none would have preceded this amount of problems at United. The club are said to finish outside the top four for the first time and it could see them miss out on Champions League football for a long time.
They suffered a 4-2 exit on aggregate, but United would be more than happy with the performance in the Champions League campaign. They have suffered several defeats at Old Trafford in the domestic campaign. Carrick said that the club are very disappointed to be knocked out of the competition, but the goal that they conceded 20 seconds after taking the lead was a bitter blow. Patrice Evra scored a long-range effort to give United an unlikely lead, which did not last for more than 30 seconds. Bayern went down the other end and equalised through Mandzukic.
With top for almost out of sight, Carrick says that the end of the season must be strong.
“We're bitterly disappointed to go out. We put ourselves in a great position, getting the first goal, and then it was only 20-odd seconds before we conceded. That was a big blow for us. Even then we were still in the game and we had a chance when Danny [Welbeck] laid it off for Wayne [Rooney]. It [not qualifying for next season’s Champions League] is obviously not good enough and we've said that,” said the midfielder with vast experience in this competition.