‘Lay off Rooney!’
New manager Gareth Southgate’s plea as England fans boo captain before 2-0 win
Caretaker says criticism of United midfielder is unfair Defeat of Malta comes as a relief after recent turmoil
Gareth Southgate appealed for the country to lay off Wayne Rooney after England secured the first victory of his caretaker reign.
Goals from Daniel Sturridge and Dele Alli handed England an uninspiring 2-0 World Cup qualifying victory over Malta, in which Rooney came in for more criticism.
Rooney’s name was booed by a section of the Wembley crowd ahead of kick-off and the captain’s performance, in which he was lucky to get away with a late challenge on Andre Schembri, sparked more debate.
“If you look at the number of games and Wayne’s goalscoring feats for England, I don’t understand that [booing],” said Southgate. “But that seems to be the landscape. I have no idea how that is expected to help him, for sure.
“I presented him with a cap in the week for being the record outfield cap holder with his country. It’s fascinating to get an insight into his world over the last 10 days. Every debate focuses on him. The onus on him is enormous.
“The criticism of him is, at times, unfair. He ploughs on and plays with pride and captains his country with pride. I always look back to the Terrys, the Lampards, the Ashley Coles. They took an enormous amount of criticism, but they kept turning out, putting themselves on the line.
“Others have withdrawn from squads when the going has got tough. Those guys put their neck on the block and played for their country again and again.”
Rooney has been under intense scrutiny ever since the European Championship when, asked to play in midfield by former manager Roy Hodgson, he failed to inspire England, who suffered an embarrassing exit against Iceland.
There have been more problems at club level, where Rooney has started the past two games on the bench. With Manchester United’s performances showing a marked improvement, there seems no immediate way back into Jose Mourinho’s first team.
Although United’s manager has been publicly supportive of his player, arguing that he is happy to play any part in a United win, the supporters at United have appeared unmoved by his plight.
Against Malta, Rooney started in a deep midfield role, a position Mourinho has claimed he cannot play.
“His experience, his leadership have been crucial throughout this week, not just today,” said Southgate. “I wanted to get Dele Alli higher up the pitch as a link between midfield and the forwards. He got his goal and was disappointed not to get a second, for sure. That team and system suited us.”
On Mourinho’s opinion of where Rooney should play, Southgate added: “Look, Jose will have his opinion on what’s right for his team. I have to pick a team to get a result today. I don’t see any point in getting drawn into that.”
Off the field, there have also been problems for Rooney and yesterday he was the subject of a front-page story saying he faced a £3.5million bill from tax authorities.
Southgate kept matters focused on football. Asked about his first experience of leading out England at Wembley as caretaker manager, Southgate said: “I was just very focused on the win. I’d have liked us to win by more and send everyone home happy. I want my team to attack but you are playing against a 5-4-1 that limits space.”
“I thought first half we played well, their keeper made good saves and, subconsciously, some of our players looked after themselves physically in the second half.
“We missed a couple of good chances but given where we were 10 days ago, I am pleased with the result.
Ryan Bertrand has withdrawan from the Tuesday’s game against Slovenia, who yesterday beat Slovakia 1-0, because of a hamstring injury, which saw him replaced after 15 minutes yesterday. Arsenal’s Kieran Gibbs has been called up.
It remains a puzzle whether it is more remarkable that 81,781 people will come on a Saturday afternoon to watch the dysfunctional bunch that are the England team play the 176th-ranked nation in the world, or that some of them turn up to boo Wayne Rooney.
After 12 days in which the Football Association has descended into a familiar chaos, a manager departed and major questions about the future, Gareth Southgate began the week presenting Rooney with his outfield record-breaking 116th cap and finished it defending his captain in the face of the Wembley booing.
The England support’s complicated relationship with Rooney continues, with his name cheered by some and booed by others at the start of the game and then, during it, further rumblings of discontent towards the man with 117 caps to his name. Southgate’s defence of the player, that Rooney has consistently made himself available to play for England while others have ducked out, had a lot of merit but no one expects it to end the argument.
Strange days at Wembley which was all but full of fans, many of whom did not seem to know why it was they were there. Watching England remains a popular diversion but it is one that is resented as much as it is cherished and, sitting in the expensive seats, David Beckham will know what it is like to endure the frustration of a crowd when your powers are on the wane.
Rooney was back in midfield for England, the position which Mourinho says he cannot play – an assertion with which the current England manager and his predecessor both disagreed. Certainly this was not a day when Rooney was going to disprove definitively the theory that he cannot play in central midfield and against an opponent as poor as Malta it was hardly a meaningful test.
There was a wild tackle from Rooney in the first half on his opposite number, the Malta captain Andre Schembri, which in some circumstances might have earned him a red card. Certainly the Swedish referee Stefan Johannesson made a mistake in not at least booking Rooney.
England played at a pace that was hypnotically slow at times, scoring twice in the first half, before the game tailed away to nothing after the break.
Southgate said that his players would naturally have their minds on Tuesday’s World Cup qualifier against Slovenia in Ljubljana but after half-time it felt like a tired finish from a tired group of footballers.
The goals from Daniel Sturridge and Dele Alli before the break were the difference in the end and England pounded grimly on the door for most of the second half with Marcus Rashford and then Jamie Vardy sent on as substitutes. Malta put 10 men behind the ball and hung on manfully for a defeat with honour.
In the hierarchy of minnows, Malta are just ahead of the true lightweights of the Uefa division, the likes of San Marino, Andorra and Gibraltar, and they seemed to have learnt a lesson from the 5-1 hammering by Scotland last month. Better organised and much fitter than the usual last seeded teams in qualifying groups, Malta were able to keep the scoreline to a very respectable two goals.
At the start of the game there was no introduction of Southgate, officially the interim manager, to the Wembley crowd and only the briefest mention of the change, and The Daily Telegraph’s part in it, in the match-day programme. The new England manager simply arrived and took the seat of the old manager with what seemed like a faint hope that no one would pay too much attention to the change.
There was a decent performance from Jordan Henderson, who was voted man of the match and had a key role in both the goals. Southgate resisted the temptation to change the balance of his team, keeping a four-man defence despite the fact that Joe Hart had just one save to make all game.
An early injury to Ryan Bertrand necessitated his replacement with Danny Rose and Kieran Gibbs has been called up as a replacement for the Southampton man.
The only surprise in Southgate’s lineup was an international debut for Jesse Lingard, a player who did the former Under-21s manager good service when he was in his squad for the European Championship in that age group last year. The Manchester United man was on the left side and twice had chances to mark his start with a goal.
Henderson crossed the ball for Alli on 22 minutes who had his header saved. It was Henderson’s ball that picked out Sturridge in the area for the first goal. There was no pace on the cross but Sturridge was able to direct his header beyond the Malta goalkeeper Andrew Hogg, whose reaction was not as quick as his team-mates might have hoped.
The Liverpool striker was in one of those moods when passing the ball was the last thing on his mind and he dribbled past opponents and lashed in shots from all angles. The second goal came when Henderson drove into the area and pinched the ball from Sturridge, who was doing what Sturridge does. The Liverpool captain presented it to Alli instead – his first shot was saved and he managed to get a toe to the rebound to put it away.
There was a chance after the break for Theo Walcott, when he was played in by Lingard on 64 minutes for a shot which Hogg saved. Alli missed from close range when Rashford whipped a ball across from the right and the game ended with a murmur of indifference from the home crowd.
The job had been done as everyone expected it would be, but the game against Slovenia will present different challenges.
Then Southgate will be obliged to come up with a plan to win a trickier away game – but even so it will be the games against Scotland and then Spain that prove a bigger test.
This was, in the circumstances, a decent start. England can only beat the opposition put in front of them, as the old saying goes, and it should be said that those opposition can be pretty uninspiring at times although the crowds do keep turning up.