The rumours about Manchester United’s Wayne Rooney moving to another club have been gaining traction. Ronald Koeman most recently claiming that “If Wayne Rooney ever becomes an option for Everton, I will be very pleased.”
However, Jose Mourinho insists that United will not entertain the thought of Rooney leaving the club whether it be to Everton or any other side, despite his mounting frustrations at Manchester United. Rooney has not started a league game since the ignominious 3-1 defeat to Watford on 18th September and has missed the last two games due to injury.
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It is a situation that Rooney, who turned 31 this week, has never found himself in his glittering career and one which Mourinho concedes, is going to be difficult for the centre-forward.
When questioned about the situation, Mourinho responded, “There is no problem at all but you need stories to sell papers.
“He can play at the top level. I can’t say what’s going to happen when he’s 32/3/4/5, but what I can say is he’s a very good player, a very important player for us.”
The manager also stated that Rooney is unhappy not playing in the XI but stated that this was normal for a footballer.
“He’s going nowhere. We like him, he likes us. He’s not happy in the last matches because he was on the bench but I think he is even unhappier when he’s not on the bench because he’s injured and has to stay in the stands.
“There are no problems at all. He’s my captain. He is the team captain. He behaves like that.
“In all my career I have had just a couple of players, they didn’t want to play and sometimes they wanted to hide when things got hotter. Apart from that, every player wants to play. I don’t know any player who is happy when he doesn’t play.”
Opinions split over Wayne Rooney
As far as headlines go, this one will probably split Manchester United fans somewhere down the middle. While many feel the captain still has a lot to offer, others feel he’s in an inevitable downward spiral and is only making up the numbers at this point. The supporters will point to his phenomenal 2009-10 and 2011-12 seasons when he played up-front to support their claim that he would do best in a striker’s role.
The naysayers, on the other hand, will claim (and maybe rightly so) that doing so would shunt the development of up and coming players such as Anthony Martial and Marcus Rashford, the future of the club. Also, his play in midfield has been average, with a lot of sideways and mis-hit passes often slowing the tempo of the game down.
Rooney is now proclaimed fit after a calf injury forced him to miss the 4-0 hiding to Chelsea in the Premier League and the narrow 1-0 victory over Manchester City in the EFL Cup.
Mourinho however, didn’t seem too bothered by the notion that Rooney could depart after a dozen years of incredible success with United, although accepting that his situation had indeed been difficult.
“I think he’s a human being like everybody else. He has a family, like everybody else
“He has kids, the oldest one at an age where he can read, he can feel, he gets a bit affected by that. It’s just human nature but I think he’s a big boy, a big character. He copes with the situation,” stated the former Chelsea manager.
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