I'm not particularly worried about a Rooney/LVG personality clash, Rooney can work hard when properly motivated.
I do wonder how LVG will manage to a) fit Rooney, Mata and RvP into the same team, b) still have Rooney playing as either a striker or no.10 and c) get the most from those three players and the team.
RvP is a better striker than Rooney and Mata is a better no.10, so if anyone is going to be shunted out of position it should be Rooney. Yet we know Rooney dislikes playing outside his favourite position and is paid too much to be left on the bench.
This is definitely a potential problem imo.
I'm not the biggest fan of Rooney, but I do think people find external or off-the-pitch reasons to criticize him when he has a bad game or run of games. In reality, he's just a streaky player, who works his socks off evey game - it's just that sometimes he looks a world-beater, while at other he looks a pub player. I don't think it's really down to his attitude. It's the same with RVP. When he had a bad game this past season, everyone moaned about his bad attitude; when he banged them in, he was pure class. Too many arm-chair shrinks around here. Thankfully Van Gaal isn't one, and do everything he can to make a good match between Rooney and his system.I think comments like this do a disservice to Fergie. He didn't win as many trophies as he did by letting players take the piss, in training or during the off-season. In his entire United career to date there's been one incident of Rooney letting off-field antics affect him at training and Fergie didn't hesitate to take him out of the team (the infamous Blackburn game in 2011/12)
This image of Rooney as a lager-swilling, lazy good for nothing doesn't fit with someone Fergie rated so highly and picked so often. People are reading far too much into some photos in the tabloids. I mean, when did you ever see Rooney let himself down in terms of work-rate or effort during a match?
No aimed at you but it's slightly ironic that so many people on here slag Rooney off as a lazy fat bastard and say someone like Kagawa should have his place in the team. When did he ever put in the type of 90 minute shift you see from Rooney? You're far more likely to see him hit the wall after an hour or so of football than our "lazy" scouser.