Jamie Carragher’s forensic analysis of Casemiro vs Liverpool is painful to watch

Lee Costello

“It was scabby.”

Jamie Carragher has forensically dismantled Casemiro’s “awful” performance against Liverpool, and even if you’re not a Man United fan, it’s painful to watch.

The Brazilian has been a revelation at Old Trafford and personifies everything that has been positive under Erik ten Hag’s short reign at the club.

The midfielder has been at the heart of everything in their recent success, so when the Red Devils were coming to Anfield, you were expecting him to step up.

This was the first time in years that United were the favourites going into the tie, but the reality of what happened will have hit them very hard.

Speaking on Monday Night Football, former Liverpool star Carragher forensically analysed Casemiro’s terrible performance and the role he played in the home side’s 7-0 thrashing of United.

“I think he’s been one of the best players this season, it feels like he completely turned around Manchester United’s season, but he was very, very poor.

“I just wanted to highlight it and look at him in his position, and the reason I’m looking at him is because I think it’s easy to look at Fred, Antony, Dalot, players like that – I think when you go away to Liverpool and you lose that badly, you look at your big players.

“You look at your centre backs, you look at Casemiro, you look at Fernandes, you look at Rashford. I’m going to look at Casemiro.

“Early on, I could see that he’s not at the races. He actually gave away five of his first six passes.

“[Looking at the opening minutes of the game] As this ball goes long, we can see he’s looking after Harvey Elliott, the ball just gets headed down and I just think a player of his class and sort of quality in a big game, that he would just knock that off, and show his class and composure.

“But he gives the ball away and it almost causes them a problem, Liverpool end up recycling the ball, he ends up at centre back with Konate, and I mentioned early on about his role and how he’s trying to look after Harvey Elliot.

“You can see Harvey Elliot now, he gets in-between the lines, and this for me again is too easy. Elliot there had a great chance of scoring, or certainly working the goalkeeper.

“Again we see him on the ball [when Casemiro loses it] I mean that’s poor, that’s awful, there’s no one near him, he loses the ball, Harvey Elliot slips past him, he can’t get that challenge in, and again this is inside the first 10 or 15 minutes, a cross comes in, and again another half chance for Liverpool.

https://twitter.com/SkySportsPL/status/1632828729297719296

“The killer goal for Manchester United was the second one, because we all envisaged that Man United would come out in the second half and he’s going to get back into the game.

“This is Casemiro in that holding role, listen he’s showing, he’s trying to help Luke Shaw – it’s a poor ball. But for Casemiro, this just summed him up, he couldn’t get near anyone, he can’t win it, he’s falling over once, he’s falling over twice, and to quote my big mate Gary Neville: ‘it was scabby’.”

Carragher did go on to praise Casemiro and underlined the point that this poor performance actually highlights why he is such a good player.

Did we see the makings of a new Liverpool front three against Manchester United at the weekend? 💭 pic.twitter.com/NmcmTs33fr

— Sky Sports Premier League (@SkySportsPL) March 6, 2023

“This has been one of the best players of the season, but what it also shows is how important he is to Manchester United. Not playing against Man City they conceded six, not playing away at Arsenal and conceding three, and basically not being at the races and Manchester United concede seven.

“So what I’m actually showing here, is yes, it’s a negative piece, but it shows how important Casemiro is for Manchester United when he’s on his game, but he was nowhere near it, he was miles off it.”

Related links: