For the better part of a year, right-back has been the one position at Old Trafford nobody had to think twice about. Diogo Dalot returns from his summer break as United's most obviously undroppable defender — and yet, for the first time in a long while, that status isn't quite as guaranteed as it looks on paper.
How Dalot Became Untouchable
It's worth remembering just how central Dalot has been to Carrick's turnaround since January. The numbers back it up: under Carrick, Dalot has effectively been immovable, and United have struggled badly in the games he's missed. Noussair Mazraoui, the most obvious alternative, simply hasn't offered enough as a like-for-like replacement in that system, leaving Dalot as one of the very few positions on the pitch nobody seriously questioned last season.
That's a genuine transformation. Under Ruben Amorim, Dalot's reputation took a battering—largely because he was often deployed out of position on the left or pushed into more attacking, unnatural roles that didn't suit him. Back in his natural right-back slot under Carrick, he's looked like one of the better players in the Premier League in that role, and the numbers from last season support it: a goal, three assists, and over 2,600 league minutes, with performances that made him one of the more consistently reliable parts of United's rebuild.
Given all of that, "Dalot's spot for the taking" would normally not even be a conversation worth having heading into a new season.
Enter Leny Yoro
Except this pre-season has thrown up a genuinely unexpected wrinkle: Leny Yoro. Signed as a centre-back, Yoro has reportedly begun to look like a real, viable option at right-back too—not simply squad cover in an emergency, but a player who could push Dalot for the shirt as the season goes on. It's not the kind of competition anyone forecast a few months ago, and it changes the calculus at the position in an interesting way.
It's easy to see why this matters more than it might for most positions. United are set to play a heavier fixture load this season with Champions League football restored, and having only one genuinely trusted option at right-back—with the most obvious backup, Mazraoui, not fully convincing in that role — was always a mild structural risk. Yoro emerging as a credible alternative doesn't threaten Dalot's status for the opener, but it does give Carrick something he hasn't really had: a second option at right-back he can actually trust.
Not a Threat to the Starting Spot — Yet
To be clear about where things stand: Dalot is going to start the season. He's simply too good, too settled, and too central to how Carrick's side has functioned since January to be dropped based on pre-season looks from a converted centre-back, however promising. Nobody serious is suggesting otherwise.
But "will start the opener" and "has zero competition for the season" are two different things, and it's the second one that's genuinely shifted. If Yoro continues to look comfortable in that role through pre-season and into the campaign, Carrick suddenly has real rotation flexibility at a position that's historically been one of United's shakier depth areas—useful for load management across a longer season and a safety net if Dalot picks up an injury, rather than the drop-off to a shakier alternative that's defined recent years.
The Fan Angle
There's also a broader context worth acknowledging here: Dalot has never been an entirely uncontroversial figure among United supporters. Pockets of the fanbase have used him as a scapegoat during rockier stretches of recent seasons—some of it understandable given how often he was misused positionally under Amorim, some of it less so. His performances under Carrick have gone a long way toward settling that argument, and deservedly so. The emergence of internal competition, ironically, might end up being the thing that cements his standing further—there's nothing like a genuine challenger to sharpen focus and remind everyone why a player earned his spot in the first place.
What to Watch
The real story here isn't whether Dalot starts against Hull—he will. It's whether Yoro's pre-season form at right-back was a one-off tactical experiment or the start of a genuine long-term plan. If it's the latter, United may have quietly solved a depth problem that's lingered at this position for years, without having to spend a transfer fee to do it. That's a quietly significant development buried underneath all the bigger midfield and stadium headlines this summer—and one worth keeping an eye on as the season gets underway.
Do you see Yoro as a genuine long-term option at right-back, or is this a pre-season story that fades once the games start counting? Let me know in the comments.
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