Bryan Mbeumo’s Struggles in the 2026–27 Season

Bryan Mbeumo’s 2026–27 league campaign has stalled almost as soon as it began.

Pre-season told a very different story. Three goals and an assist in six games hinted at a revival, a throwback to the Brentford version of Mbeumo: direct, ruthless, constantly threatening the goal. He looked sharp, decisive, and dangerous.

Now? Not so much.

A passenger on the flank

Across seven league appearances, Mbeumo has drifted through games rather than grabbed them. He still surfaces with the odd chance, a half-opening here, a shot there, but for long stretches he disappears. For a player signed to be a difference-maker, that’s a problem.

Two goals and an assist on paper look respectable. They’ve probably masked how subdued he has been. His complete lack of goal involvement in the last three matches has stripped away that disguise and forced a harder look at what’s going wrong with United’s number 19.

One thing has never been in doubt: Mbeumo is a genuine goal threat. His best football has always come when he lives close to the penalty area, where one touch, one run, one finish can decide a game.

Right now, he is being dragged away from that zone.

Instead of the central or inside-right role that suited him at Brentford – and that Ruben Amorim reportedly had in mind – Michael Carrick is using him as an old-school, touchline winger. Mbeumo spends most of his time chalk on his boots, hugging the sideline, receiving the ball wide and deep.

That does not play to his strengths. He is not a showboating dribbler who thrives in repeated one-on-one duels out on the flank. The more he’s pinned to the line, the less he threatens the goal. The pattern is familiar: this is how his form tailed off in the second half of last season, and it is why he looks blunted again now.

Move him back towards goal

Carrick has a simple adjustment available: drag Mbeumo back into the areas where he hurts teams.

Use him as an inverted winger. Let him step inside off the right. Let him attack the half-spaces. Encourage him to dart beyond defenders instead of standing in front of them, waiting for the ball. Get him arriving in the box, not just feeding it.

With a right-back overlapping and holding the width, the structure on that flank would remain intact. The difference would be that United’s right-sided attacker becomes a finisher again, not a reluctant crosser.

Because that’s the crux of it: United did not bring Mbeumo in to swing hopeful balls into the area. They signed him for his sharpness in front of goal, for the instinct that turns half-chances into goals.

Unlocking that version of Mbeumo is not a mystery. Push him inside as an inverted winger. Trust him as a number nine when the game demands it. Get him closer to the penalty spot and further from the touchline.

If Carrick makes that call, United might finally see the player they thought they were getting – and Mbeumo’s season might yet ignite.