WHY SAY ANYTHING?

In a normal job anybody, especially somebody in a senior position, who fell below the required standard would be sacked. Their contract would not necessarily be paid off, as it is with football managers, because falling below the required level would be seen as a breach of that contract and, therefore, a sackable offence.

On the “Sunday Supplement“, a TV chat show where members of the written press attempt to show us how clever and knowledgeable they are, the general feeling was that Wayne Rooney should be exempt from this treatment. He shouldn’t be booed because it never happened to John Terry, Bryan Robson, Terry Butcher and other England captains. He shouldn’t be booed because he was once a “great player” opined one of our noted scribes. He shouldn’t be booed because, basically, he is Wayne Rooney.

They are all agreeing with the interim coach who also feels that people should “lay off Rooney“, probably because he selected him both as a player and to remain as captain and the criticism reflects badly on him, making him appear weak and indecisive, of which he is both.

If Rooney is continually selected for club and country, as captain or otherwise, and if he continues to perform as badly as he has been doing for the last three years or so, why is nobody supposed to criticise him or express their feelings?

In all walks of life people make bad decisions. If they have anything about themselves they learn from the experience so as not to make the same mistake again.

David Moyes continually selected Rooney and his reign was one big disaster. Van Gaal arrived and made him captain, guaranteeing him a starting place because “he is my captain“. This suggested that, regardless of how badly he played, Rooney would always be picked, as was proven to be the case.

José Mourinho did not, initially, want to rock the boat and change everything about the van Gaal years. So he went for a smoother transition, only bringing in four players and keeping Rooney as captain. It wasn’t too long, however, before there was talk of the majority of van Gaal’s signings being shown the door, and of Rooney being dropped to the bench, which followed quite quickly.

The guy is paid anything between £200K and £300K per week, depending upon which newspaper you choose to believe. He is the captain of Manchester United and England for some strange reason. Why the heck should he be given an easy ride when his performances for both teams are well below average?

As for the other captains mentioned earlier. None of them continued to be selected when they were past it. All of them would have given blood for the cause and all of them were passionate about their club and their country. Comparing Rooney with these captains of the past is like comparing Bambi with Rambo, or the Terminator.

He is not captaincy material and should never have been given the armband, either for club or country. It is difficult to say whether or not it has affected his form as he was playing badly before his promotion so, suffice to say, his demotion to the bench with United was totally merited.

How his inclusion in the England team was merited is a question for Gareth Southgate who, after one game in charge, finds himself under pressure for a dour performance against a team against whom Scotland managed to score five goals!

So should we lay off Rooney as requested? Absolutely not! If there are morons involved with the English game who are prepared to pick him that is their problem. I would be far more concerned if Mourinho hadn’t yet seen the light at Manchester United but, as he has taken the appropriate action, Rooney is currently safe from his critics at Old Trafford.

But what of the bigger picture?

Thankfully for him, he only has to concern himself with that when he steps onto the field wearing an England shirt!