ROONEY READY TO SEAL SHOCK DERBY MOVE
Wayne Rooney is poised for an astonishing return to english football as a playercoach with Derby County. The forward is 13 months into a three-year contract with DC United in Major League Soccer but he flew to england last night and is expected to finalise a move to Pride Park today. Rooney has immersed himself in US life but has been planning for many months how to make the next step in his career by moving into management. The 33-year-old was impressed by the opportunity Frank Lampard received at Derby last season and is interested in a player-coach role at last season’s Championship play-off finalists. Derby began their campaign last night with a 2-1 win at Huddersfield and manager Phillip Cocu was asked about Rooney after the match. ‘at the moment I can’t say anything. We are working on completing the team and we said it was not complete yet,’ said the former Barcelona player. ‘It’s true we’re working to get the team done but I can’t say anything about names before things are done. There are a few more days, hopefully something more can happen.’
THE supreme optimists among the Derby faithful will view the prospect of Wayne Rooney arriving at their club as the contemporary equivalent of another legendary 33-year-old — Dave Mackay — signing at the start of the 1968-69 season.
Brian Clough paid Tottenham £5,000 for the player who within a year was named joint Football Writers’ Player of the Year after getting Derby promoted to the First Division.
A forgotten part of the Mackay story was the first conversation the Scot had with Peter Taylor — Clough’s assistant and the man who insisted Derby sign him — after arriving at the club. Taylor told him that he would be moved into a sweeper role, from where he would use his influence to turn defence into attack.
‘I didn’t want to have dads taking their kids and them saying, “Who’s that fat guy?”’ Mackay reflected years later. ‘I used to be up and down the pitch the whole time. But Derby gave me a role I could have played until I was 50. It was perfect. It worked so well.’
The world has turned, of course, and the relentlessly competitive nature of the second tier means there will be no sanctuary in central defence for the ageing Rooney now.
If he leaves Washington DC for Pride Park, he will be asked to wield his influence and vision from the centre of midfield and it is a serious stretch of logic to suggest that he will be instrumental in sending Derby up.
Rooney has enjoyed a renaissance in the MLS but the standard of competition is benign by comparison with the Championship. Ashley Cole, who came and went from Derby inside six months, proves that point.
None of which subtracts from what a fine move it could be, not least for Derby’s coaching set-up.
Roy Hodgson always felt that Rooney’s powers of leadership were rather overlooked in the popular characterisation of him.
The former England manager liked to relate how Rooney astonished everyone with his erudition, having been asked to speak after a briefing from Dr Steve Peters, England’s then sports psychiatrist, before Euro 2016.
Former FA head of performance Dave Reddin, who asked England captains to share responsibility for talking and analysing, was always impressed with him, too.
But beyond his motivational contribution, Rooney will bring back to these shores that incredible, innate capacity to do the most extraordinary things.
To view the goal Rooney scored form his own half for DC United against Orlando City in June — a clip viewed 2million times on YouTube — was to remember what British football has been missing.
Derby — within driving distance of Liverpool, allowing Rooney’s wife and sons to settle at home again — offers multiple attractions to the family. If expectations remain realistic, it could be an inspired move for player and club.