Baleba’s Second Injury Leaves Carrick Without £70m Midfielder Through Anfield

Michael Carrick confirmed on Friday that Carlos Baleba will miss “a number of weeks” with the hamstring injury he suffered early in the second half of Tuesday’s 3-2 Champions League win over Roma at Old Trafford — a second layoff already for the £70m summer signing after only five starts in Manchester United colours.

The Cameroon midfielder, 22, will not return this week and will not be available over the international break. “It’ll be a number of weeks,” Carrick said. “It’s definitely not this week and it won’t be any time over the international break. It’ll be a little bit longer than that.” That timeline locks Baleba out of Sunday’s Premier League home game against Aston Villa, the Nov. 22 trip to Liverpool at Anfield, and the Champions League visit to Sporting CP in Lisbon three days later.

United are still assessing the full extent of the damage. The Independent reported that the club is waiting to see whether Baleba plays again this calendar year, with potential uncertainty stretching into December — a month that includes seven fixtures, among them Arsenal on Dec. 20. Manchester United’s official account flagged the update on Friday: “The boss has a fresh update on the fitness of Carlos Baleba.”

Baleba arrived from Brighton in the summer on a contract running to 2031 with an option, in a deal reported at £70m. He missed the start of the season with an ankle injury picked up in pre-season and known before the move was completed. His debut came around Oct. 10 after that ankle recovery.

Before Tuesday’s night against Roma, he had made only seven appearances for United. The Independent noted that he had started just five games since leaving Brighton. The Roma hamstring problem is therefore not a first interruption of his Old Trafford career — it is the second, arriving before he has built any sustained run in Carrick’s midfield.

He was forced off roughly in the first minute of the second half against Roma after a driving run into the box, and match-night reporting from the Manchester Evening News and Getty imagery described him appearing in tears and clear distress as he left the pitch. Youri Tielemans came on for him and may now see a longer stretch of starts while Baleba recovers.

The immediate cost is clear. Without Baleba, Carrick prepares for Villa at Old Trafford without the summer’s headline midfield reinforcement, then faces Anfield and Lisbon without him as well. Those three fixtures sit on the far side of the international window; Carrick’s wording leaves no room for an early surprise return.

United’s league position sharpens the problem. Reporting from The Guardian and Sky Sports places the club 17th in the Premier League, separated from the relegation zone only by goal difference. A midfielder bought to accelerate the rebuild is instead unavailable for the run that includes a derby at Anfield and a Champions League away night in Portugal.

Carrick’s own future ahead of the Villa fixture has already been covered separately by El Futbolero ; Friday’s confirmed medical news adds a concrete selection constraint to that weekend rather than reopening the boardroom debate. The injury list around him is already busy enough. Patrick Dorgu is slowly returning from a hamstring problem — his second of this calendar year — and trained a little this week, though Carrick said he was unsure whether the full-back would be available against Villa and stressed the need to be patient after a couple of hamstring issues.

Other shorter- and medium-term absences noted in Friday’s Standard round-up include Luke Shaw, Benjamin Sesko, Manuel Ugarte and Marcus Rashford. Lisandro Martínez is suspended for the Villa match, and Harry Maguire was listed as a doubt after limping off midweek. Those names sit around Baleba’s confirmed multi-week absence; they do not change the central fact that the £70m midfielder is already unavailable for the Anfield and Sporting dates.

Competitors will file the story as another United injury blow. The sharper reading is chronological. Baleba’s United career so far is an ankle layoff, a delayed debut, five starts, and now a hamstring that Carrick has publicly stretched beyond the international break. For a club sitting 17th and still assessing whether the midfielder returns before the year turns, that sequence is the story — not merely that he is “out for weeks.”

Carrick must rebuild midfield continuity without the player United paid Brighton to provide it. Tielemans and the remaining options will carry the load through Villa, then through the wait for Anfield and Lisbon. United’s medical staff continue to map the full recovery; Carrick’s Friday comments already define the floor of that wait.

The next on-pitch checkpoint for the squad is Sunday against Villa. Baleba will not be part of it, and on Carrick’s own timeline he will not be part of the November run that follows. For a £70m signing still short of a settled first season, the second injury has already rewritten the calendar through Anfield.