Rooney saga - A perfect example of the media's sensationalism

Apologies for the rather long headline, but I just had to! It was the only way to express what is a mix of frustration and anger at what has been another example how low journalism in English Football has reached, especially when anything associated with the Premier League is concerned.

This isn’t a ‘I love Rooney, how dare you doubt him’ article but just my observations on the nonsense that the tabloids churn out everyday. After all, when the media starts harping about how Wayne Rooney is unhappy, Fergie is unhappy, everyone hates everyone, so on and so forth, you can’t help but get annoyed at the stupidity that their articles present to readers. It’s no help that these articles are more often than not based on pure assumptions and speculation.

I don’t know where the rumor began from or how it did, but once the “very reliable” British tabloids reported it, it just had to be true, right?! They are after all the harbingers of the truth in the deep, dark and murky world of Premier League football; where Premier League players are nothing more than money chasing greedy pigs who deserve to be cursed, not loved by fans!

The next phase of this story will be the start of the ‘Real Madrid dream’ rumors, Manchester City‘s “audacious” bids and all those standard transfer headlines trying to get people to read the utter tosh they put together! But unfortunately at the end of the day, it always works and we all read that nonsense.

The reality of the whole matter is just so different! What basically was Rooney being dropped for lacking match fitness, and Sir Alex playing the fitter striker, has erupted into a media driven frenzy where Rooney is supposed to be on the verge of leaving the club?!

It’s incredible that Sir Alex had to come out and affirm his belief that Rooney and Van Persie could play together; Really?

We needed the manager to come out and state the obvious? Just think about it, why would Sir Alex spend so much to bring in RvP and then, without even playing the duo together, decide that they were incapable of performing well in the same starting XI!

But it won’t end there, not until the morons who call themselves journalists realize that just sitting at a desk and rehashing rumours that they claim came from “sources” (Twitter: “ITK’s” and self-proclaimed “Football agents”) is not really journalism; it’s something even a teenager can and has done. But I doubt the newspapers really care, they will just go on creating rumours out of thin air!

Either way going into the ethics and morality of all this is just going to be a massive waste of time because at the end of the day, they have a job only because there’s a demand for such sensational news. So we actually fuel their need to keep writing more & more sensational stuff in the race to get the more reads!

The truth is that Rooney and Van Persie are more than capable of playing together and why shouldn’t they be? They were the 2 best strikers in the league last season, are capable of playing in a variety of positions or roles and together with their technical ability and movement, should cause nightmares for defenders instead of creating silly transfer rumours.

If you look back, Van Persie started off his Arsenal career playing as the second striker or occasionally even as the winger. This was before he moved to the role of the main striker following Adebayor’s departure to Manchester City. This has also been the story with Rooney too, as he played second fiddle to Ruud van Nistelrooy and then Ronaldo before stepping in to the role of the main goal scorer for the team.

As you read above, versatility in attack is something they were known for as they developed into the stars they are today. So to assume that the two can’t play together just because Rooney didn’t start a match due to lack of fitness and then go on to insinuate that Rooney’s ready to move on because of it, is nothing but absolute insanity.

To imply that Fergie has developed a sudden distrust in Wayne’s ability after his performance against Everton was just the press kicking someone when they’re down! Neither could Rooney prove the doubters wrong against Southampton and nor could Sir Alex play him to prove that he and Robin van Persie are more than capable of playing together.

At the end of the day, the media should stop trying to create sensational news when there is really nothing to write home about. Instead of easing off on the rumor mill after Rooney’s injury that forced to sit out of the Southampton game, they took the opportunity to continue to make it seem like everything was just getting worse!

I guess we can’t help avoid vultures circling when they see prey wounded and this is exactly what this was about. Opportunistic sensationalism is what the whole saga was.