Carrick: Heaven and Yoro are in a really good place

The duo, who are good friends off the pitch, were a topic in Friday’s pre-match press conference as they could be the centre-back partnership Carrick opts for when we visit Chelsea in Saturday night’s Premier League clash.

Yoro has started each of the Reds’ last six games, while Heaven is a candidate to come in for Lisandro Martinez, who is suspended following the red card he received in the defeat to Leeds last time out.

Martinez was replacing Harry Maguire, who had started each of our previous 10 outings before Monday night, but a red card of his own against Bournemouth saw him unavailable for the visit of our Yorkshire rivals.

The England international has since had an extra game added to his initial one-match ban by the FA, meaning he’ll miss this weekend's trip to Stamford Bridge too.

Having spoke about Ayden specifically earlier in the first part of the press conference, Carrick was then asked about Heaven and Yoro together, and if they could be the future of our backline.

He said: “In terms of predicting the future, I think you have to be careful what you try and predict, but certainly we're delighted to have both of them and the ages that they're at to have played in the Premier League for such a big club, it's not always the case.

“I think it's a position… to be in the team at a young age in a big club, it's not always easy, it's not always straightforward. So, for the two boys to have played that, they have had different amounts [of game time] at different times, but I think the experience and the stage that they're at now, they're at a really good stage.

“The future is the future, they need to keep progressing and we'll give them the opportunity to do that, whether that's with training off the pitch and the coaching side and the help and the advice, and certainly the game time as well. 

“So, I think they're both in a really good place at the moment. It's probably as well as you can hope for centre-backs at the age that they're at.”

Twenty-year-old Yoro made his 63rd United appearance on Monday night and is into his second season at the club, after arriving from French club Lille in the summer of 2024.

Heaven, meanwhile, is a year younger and joined us from Arsenal midway through the previous term, racking up 21 senior appearances for the Reds since then.

Those respective experiences will come in handy if the pair are tasked with partnering each other in the heart of our backline at Chelsea, with Maguire, Martinez and the injured Matthijs de Ligt all out.

Carrick was asked about the situations surrounding Martinez and, first, Maguire at the start of his press conference, saying: “To be honest, there's not much we can react to. Massively disappointed, of course [to have Harry suspended for an additional game].

“The decision made is something that we're really disappointed with in many ways, but that's it now. We've got to move on and we will do.”

On Martinez, he added: “I think we're obviously disappointed, we didn't agree with it. I think it was pretty obvious how I felt after the game and I still feel that way.

“I don't want to go into it now, I think it is what it is. We've been hit with some decisions and, at the end of the day, now we've just got to accept it and move on, whether we like them or not.”

Kick-off on Saturday is at 20:00 BST and you can predict the line-up by playing the United Predictions game in our app, with prizes up for grabs.