Michael Carrick calls for improvement after Manchester United's opening defeat to Hull

Michael Carrick says he will not overreact, but has called for improvement after Manchester United started the season with a 2-0 defeat at Hull. United lost their opening game for the fourth time in the past seven years as Semi Ajayi and Nobel Mendy took advantage of poor defending from set-pieces.

The United head coach presented a professional exterior despite United’s performance not reaching the desired standard as they were deservedly beaten by Hull, who finished sixth in the Championship last season.

“I’m talking to you quite calmly, but I’m not exactly calm inside and enjoying the day, so there’s a big difference,” he said. “I played [for United] for a long time. You don’t get to play here for a long time without just going day by day, the results, the ups and downs, but you just carry on as normal.

“It’s 100% not that, and trust me, it’s not that. It just doesn’t mean that we all have to shout and scream and come out and create some chaos just because of it. Inside we’re hurting and we need to get better. But the calmness doesn’t mean there’s no emotion in it, for sure.”

He added: “The result’s the result. We got beat, we’re hurt and it’s not a nice feeling. It doesn’t mean it’s going to change the whole direction of how we’re going as a team or as a football club.

“It’s one game and results can happen in football, we all understand that. It’s not nice when they do, but it does happen.”

United barely threatened throughout the 90 minutes. “Same mistakes as we did last season, every away game,” Bruno Fernandes said. “We gave too much of the ball to them, in the first 20 minutes the goalkeeper had more touches on the ball, too much time. We need to press a little bit more, be more aggressive, and set-plays – we need to work on it, to be more aggressive and try not to concede these types of goals.”

Hull’s head coach, Sergej Jakirovic, said he and his backroom staff had spotted a weakness in the way United defended set-pieces, but would not divulge his “secret” that helped to expose it.

Hull are strongly tipped for relegation and their supporters sung “are you watching Joe Cole?” during the match after the pundit mocked their chances of survival. “I don’t have any problems with critics with opinions,” Jakirovic said. “We tried to prove them wrong and today we won the game. Now it’s 37 to go, so we will try to continue like this. I’m very, very happy because of all the people in the club.”