A number of Manchester United players are said to feel unwelcome at the club, with concerns that higher earners are being deliberately targeted to encourage their departure.
Pay disputes and exit tensions precede fresh dressing-room claim
On 10 March 2025, Sir Jim Ratcliffe described some United players as “not good enough” or “overpaid”. He named Casemiro, Rasmus Hojlund, Andre Onana, Antony and Jadon Sancho among the inherited commitments facing the club.
Four days later, Bruno Fernandes responded that players did not want to be labelled overpaid and pointed out that the club had agreed the contracts in question.
Further friction emerged in July 2025 when Marcus Rashford, Alejandro Garnacho, Antony, Sancho and Tyrell Malacia trained separately from the main group after United said all five wanted transfers.
Fernandes then disclosed in April 2026 that United officials had told him they would not stand in his way if he accepted a major offer from Saudi Arabian side Al-Hilal in 2025.
More recently, Lisandro Martínez criticised the club’s summer recruitment after the 2-0 defeat at Atlético Madrid on 13 October 2026 and said he expected more from director of football Jason Wilcox. Sky Sports subsequently reported that Martínez had wanted to join Atlético during the summer, while at least one teammate challenged his public remarks.
Multiple players allegedly feel pushed towards the exit
Pilib De Brún (Phil Brown) from Beyond the Pitch on NBC Sports has now relayed an account from an individual whom he described as being in a position of knowledge about the situation at United.
Brown claims the source told him: “A number of players don’t feel welcome at the club and feel that there is a deliberate targeting of higher paid players to get them to leave.
“A number of the defenders wanted to leave this summer because they have been told they are being replaced in a year and some of those players are down to the last year of their contract.
“Those players are not going to play through injuries for fear of jeopardizing a move and they feel that when they have played through injuries and had a poor game as a result, nobody ever explains to the fans that they have been carrying injuries.
“Half that Utd team don’t want to be there because they feel like the club don’t want them to be there.”
If Brown’s source is right, it could explain why it seems that Michael Carrick is working with one hand tied behind his back this season. and perhaps why the defence in particular has been so fragile. None of the older defenders have played well and there have been a number of injuries to the likes of Luke Shaw, Lisandro Martinez, Noussair Mazraoui and Matthijs de Ligt.
Final Thoughts
At the moment this is just hearsay, albeit from a club source to a reputable journalist. Nonetheless, it has a ring of truth to it and would explain a lot, including Martinez’ well-publicised outburst. INEOS have a lot of explaining to do.