Why I’m sticking up for Rooney
ALL week I’ve taken others’ criticism of Wayne Rooney on board, listening to the constant chipping away at what he apparently cannot do and why he is no longer good enough. Each day I’ve felt my mouth open a little more in disbelief. Most of what has been said is nonsense.
I want to make it clear here that I’m not going to paint a picture to suggest Rooney is in his pomp. He isn’t the dynamic force of nature he once was. It would be ridiculous to try to say he is and certain observations about him have been legitimate.
Ridiculous, though, is the perfect word to describe some of the things that have been said about him since England’s 1-0 win in Slovakia. What exactly was so awful about his performance that has prompted this dissection?
Everything stems from Sam Allardyce playing him in central midfield in Trnava when he had previously said he’d never use him in that position. Jose Mourinho also said he would never play him as a No 6 or a No 8. Both of those managers made mistakes saying that.
Maybe people are finding it hard to accept the idea that a top striker has dropped deeper for club and country. Perhaps they have remembered the words of Mourinho and Allardyce and are forming opinions from there.
Is it a hangover from Euro 2016? Rooney — like everyone else — was awful against Iceland but only two or three England players were better than him and when he did not play against Slovakia in SaintEtienne, England missed his ability to get on the ball and pass it. It is inevitable when you get older that you start dropping deeper down the pitch. Strikers do it — look at how Zlatan Ibrahimovic plays now — and so do defenders.
Paul Scholes and Steven Gerrard found themselves becoming sitting midfielders, having started off their careers rampaging forward; flying wingers Ryan Giggs and John Barnes both reinvented themselves as central midfielders. Were they as good as in their original positions? Of course not.
What is it about our culture that enjoyment is taken when greats are on the wane?
People couldn’t wait for Steve McClaren to get David Beckham out of the England team, for instance. Brendan Rodgers had to cope with a clamour to construct a Liverpool team without Gerrard.
Why are we in such a hurry to get rid of players with such experience and quality? Why is Rooney the latest to find himself getting the same treatment?
If there is a queue of great talent waiting to come in and take his place, I haven’t seen it.
All that came to mind when I watched England last weekend. Rooney wasn’t brilliant, as Allardyce claimed he was, but he was still one of the better players on the day and played the pass of the match to Theo Walcott. You wouldn’t have had anyone else as captain for the new manager’s first game.
Yes, he was guilty, at times, of being on his own central defenders’ toes to take possession and that is something Allardyce — and Mourinho — should tell him about but, you know, it was refreshing to see him still so enthusiastic, wanting to get on the ball at all times.
Over the last three or four years, the role of a central midfielder has evolved. Wingers now come inside, full backs push high up the pitch, so you now see midfielders going in between central defenders and taking up semi full-back positions. Why? It is all to do with finding space. Players nowadays can’t cope unless they are given specific instructions, where to be and what to do.
But Rooney still has the schoolboy in him, that desire to chase and make things happen and that’s what Allardyce meant when he said Rooney could play ‘where he wants’.
Yet I’ve heard people saying he was trying to impersonate Andrea Pirlo; Peter Shilton came out and claimed he should have retired from international football after the summer. Those comments were rich.
You could argue that Shilton should have retired after the European Championship in 1988. At the World Cup in 1990, he was 40 and his legs had gone. You saw that in the semi- final against West Germany, when he could not jump to keep out a looping free-kick from Andreas Brehme.
On Sky they talked about what he did in the No 10 role. On these pages, meanwhile, it was said Rooney was ‘killing Harry Kane’ and a graphic highlighted that ‘our striker never had any touches in the box’. He didn’t play as a No 10 or a striker!
Another argument was formed about England being better when Dele Alli came on. They were. All the balls Alli received came from Rooney. And why should he have Rooney’s place? I’m a big fan of the Tottenham midfielder but he had a poor tournament and hasn’t started the season well.
Rooney has said he will retire from international football after the next World Cup, but if he is still in the team by the time Russia comes around, then Jack Wilshere, Ross Barkley and Alli will have to ask themselves what they have done wrong if they can’t displace someone who will then be 32.
This idea that England would be better off without him needs to be forgotten. He has got experience and presence that nobody else in the squad can match, nobody passes it better than him and aside from that, you would back him ahead of anyone else in the squad if he got a chance to score.
The comeback that Rooney won’t be able to do it against the better nations is also redun- dant because let me ask who exactly would be able to have that kind of influence against, say, Spain, Germany or France when we couldn’t even beat Iceland?
His days as a centre forward are over. Ibrahimovic, Marcus Rashford and Anthony Martial are better options with United; Kane and Daniel Sturridge are better options for England.
But he is Wayne Rooney and that is why managers want him in their team. They don’t want to lose his quality. I like the role he is playing for Manchester United, floating between the area that a second striker would occupy and the engine room.
He can orchestrate play now — look at his touch map from the opening game of the season against Bournemouth (left), when he also scored. And go back to May when he saved the FA Cup for Manchester United with a surge from deep to create Juan Mata’s equalising goal. He’s also created goals against Southampton and Hull this season. This is his future.
And do not doubt Rooney still has a future for club and country. I’ve said before he’s more like a 35-yearold in terms of football, given he has 716 games in his legs, and I’m not remotely claiming he is as spectacular and dynamic as that exuberant teenager who burst on to the scene.
Rooney is a completely different player. His critics should try to understand that — and think before they come out with any more nonsense.
No one has his presence or experience