Wayne Rooney | 2012-14 Performances

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adexkola said:
I'm interested in knowing why you think their dribbling decline has occurred in different ways. How do we know Ronaldo wasn't curbed by Ferguson somewhere between 2007 and 2008, or that Rooney shifted his priorities?
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Maybe it is - what is clear is that their style has changed. I'm just speculating as to why. I think with Rooney the curbing of his aggression happened round about the start of that 06/07 season, which is also when he started to become less direct. With Ronaldo, his ability and willingness to beat his man decreased exactly in tandem with his change in style in 07/08.

Maybe Fergie did have something to do with it but, then again, I can't imagine Fergie going to players with stand out attributes and telling them to curb them. Ronaldo's dribbling was absolutely quality in 06/07 - not technically as good as Iniesta's, say, but so effective. There would be very, very little between Ronaldo and Messi had he kept that.
 
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Varun_Utd said:
He has changed his style and must have changed his training methods to optimize his present game. I doubt he spends as much time as he used to practicing his dribbling because it has certainly gotten worse.
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I don't think that's true at all. Whether or not he practices dribbling in training (and Ronaldo is, by all accounts, an obsessive perfectionist in training) he still dribbles plenty during matches. More than enough opportunities to hone his skill, never mind prevent it from regressing.

I just think Ronaldo and Rooney were both a little limited in their ability to dribble to begin with. Ronaldo has always been the more accomplished of the two but even he had a relatively limited bag of tricks to beat his man with. He could do that chop thing with the inside of his right foot and step-overs but he generally relied on pace and power to beat his man. Rooney's dribbling was even more one-dimensional, basically kick and rush. Neither of them have ever had the same capacity for feints, body swerves or rapid changes of direction that you get from the really accomplished dribblers like Messi, Nani* or (oh yes) Giggs.

The reason I think Rooney and Ronaldo appear to have got worse at dribbling is because of a combination of opposing managers using specific tactics to nullify them as a threat (making sure that there's always at least 2 men closing them down when they get on the ball) and opposing defenders getting used to playing against them and getting better and better at reading what they're going to do next. Because they're both clever footballers they've adapted their game and are no longer as reliant on dribbling past players to score/create goals. The ability is still there, though, it's not as effective as it was when they were still relatively unknown quantities.



*Nani's an interesting one. He's a bit like Ronaldo in that he has a limited array of tricks to beat his man and can't send defenders the wrong way with a drop of his shoulder like Messi but he has such quick feet it doesn't really matter
 
That's one of the most accurate posts I've read in here for a while. Can't disagree with any sentence.
 
RedDevilCanuck said:
We would be fecked without him. No question about that.
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Yeah like we were fecked when King Eric retired, and when Keano left, we collapsed then, didnt we end up nearly getting relegated? And we've not won a thing since Ronaldo left.

Rooney is a great player and important to the way we play, but we have lost better and more influencial players in the past and gone from strength to strength, We most certainly would NOT be fecked without him.
 
Sparky_Hughes said:
Yeah like we were fecked when King Eric retired, and when Keano left, we collapsed then, didnt we end up nearly getting relegated? And we've not won a thing since Ronaldo left.

Rooney is a great player and important to the way we play, but we have lost better and more influencial players in the past and gone from strength to strength, We most certainly would NOT be fecked without him.
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Those days are over. Star players want the most amount of money they can get and the truth of the matter is they can't get the most at United.

If Rooney left today who out there could properly replace him? RVP is good but is an injury prone near 30 year old who could break down at any time.

And all the other foreign stars just don't wanna come here.
 
RedDevilCanuck said:
Those days are over. Star players want the most amount of money they can get and the truth of the matter is they can't get the most at United.

If Rooney left today who out there could properly replace him? RVP is good but is an injury prone near 30 year old who could break down at any time.

And all the other foreign stars just don't wanna come here.
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Same way we replaced Cantona, Keane, Ruud, Ronaldo etc. with foreign stars?
 
RedDevilCanuck said:
Those days are over. Star players want the most amount of money they can get and the truth of the matter is they can't get the most at United.

If Rooney left today who out there could properly replace him? RVP is good but is an injury prone near 30 year old who could break down at any time.

And all the other foreign stars just don't wanna come here.
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Kagawa. Next question?
 
I was thinking more along the lines of Villa, Drogba, Ibrahimovich. Only players of this calibre could properly replace Rooney.
 
RedDevilCanuck said:
I was thinking more along the lines of Villa, Drogba, Ibrahimovich. Only players of this calibre could properly replace Rooney.
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I can see where you are coming from although I disagree, you could change system, try and bring in a world class or near world class attacking mid, IE Kagawa to supply Welbeck and Chico.

Noone is THAT important to the club, except SAF :)
 
As it stands I think if Rooney left and we signed a top notch CM (Modric or Martinez) we would be a stronger team.
 
Sparky_Hughes said:
I can see where you are coming from although I disagree, you could change system, try and bring in a world class or near world class attacking mid, IE Kagawa to supply Welbeck and Chico.

Noone is THAT important to the club, except SAF :)
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That's it basically. We lost the best winger in world football and replaced him with a winger from Wigan who is now, by my definition, world class. The end result is that we still have the best set of wingers in the league.

Others rise and fall while we evolve, and we always will while Fergies in charge.
 
Walrus said:
As it stands I think if Rooney left and we signed a top notch CM (Modric or Martinez) we would be a stronger team.
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Yeah let's replace someone who got us 35 goals last season and is going to be our all time top scorer soon and instead rely on Kagawa supplying Welbeck. That will be fantastic.
 
Cina said:
Not to mention since that single glorious chip against David James he's felt the need to try a bazillion of them in every match and not scored a single one since.
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Did it vs Boro in the Fa Cup too.
 
Rooney's finishing and poaching abilities have become world class. Coupled with everything else he brings to the table, I'd say he's one of the best forwards in world football.

His consistancy is a bit poor for a top, top player though, I think that's what really holding him back from becoming the player he could conceivably be.
 
marjen said:
Rooney's finishing and poaching abilities have become world class. Coupled with everything else he brings to the table, I'd say he's one of the best forwards in world football.

His consistancy is a bit poor for a top, top player though, I think that's what really holding him back from becoming the player he could conceivably be.
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I get the feeling Rooney is a bit bored with United. He's been for a long time now and I think like other top players like Ronaldo and Fabregas, his hunger would increase with a change of scenery. I hope not though. I'm happy with him here. I think getting RVP here would appeal to his galaticos nature and would give him some serious competition up front.
 
I have a feeling Wazza will be sold next summer and that Fergie is trying to get RVP this season to soften the blow and to ease Kagawa into things as he might eventually be Rooneys replacement. With the money we could get for a Rooney sale...Fergie may be thinking its best for both sides before he ages too muh and loses too much value. A lesser talented player might have been sold already for behaving in the way Rooney has at times and maybe Fergie feels next summer could be the time to ship him out but maybe Im way off the mark!
 
wr8_utd said:
Yeah let's replace someone who got us 35 goals last season and is going to be our all time top scorer soon and instead rely on Kagawa supplying Welbeck. That will be fantastic.
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No one is saying replace him, im just arguing we would not be fecked if we did.
 
Yes i reckon we would. He's our talisman and the heartbeat of the team, and we do not have a 35 goal striker after him
 
SATA said:
Yes i reckon we would. He's our talisman and the heartbeat of the team, and we do not have a 35 goal striker after him
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Maybe, its difficult to say with any certainty as no other striker gets picked for every game regardless of form. Who is to say how many chico would score given fifty games a season.
 
Sparky_Hughes said:
Maybe, its difficult to say with any certainty as no other striker gets picked for every game regardless of form. Who is to say how many chico would score given fifty games a season.
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Not saying we would be fecked, as we have a very good team regardless but we would have no other top class striker. Welbeck is young and a poor finisher, and Hernandez is nothing but a finisher. Neither could be relied as being our main striker throughout the season. Sure we can replace Wayne as a number 10 with kagawa but we'd be in serious trouble to find a consistent goalscorer without him. Anyways I hope we play him as our main striker this season, and not as a number 10 because I believe kagawa is more suited to that role.
 
SATA said:
Yes i reckon we would. He's our talisman and the heartbeat of the team, and we do not have a 35 goal striker after him
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'Talisman' and 'heartbeat' are not very precise footballing terms. What does he actually do that another player, Kagawa say, couldn't?

Kagawa probably wouldn't score as many goals - even if allowed to take penalties - but playing behind Van Persie that wouldn't necessarily be a big problem.
 
Again looked poor when played behind striker, but I must say he looked really good in final 20 or so minutes as a striker. Scored a nice free kick, but that dive was embarassing.
 
Will Absolute said:
'Talisman' and 'heartbeat' are not very precise footballing terms. What does he actually do that another player, Kagawa say, couldn't?

Kagawa probably wouldn't score as many goals - even if allowed to take penalties - but playing behind Van Persie that wouldn't necessarily be a big problem.
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:rolleyes: You've watched Kagawa for how long now?

And to answer your question, Freekicks.
 
That header for Kagawa's goal was quality. So well timed.

The Rooney that turned up particularly in the latter stages of the game is an amazing footballer. If we get him playing like that every week, and if Kagawa, Nani and Cleverley hit it off as expected, we're in for some seriously exciting stuff this year.
 
I thought he played well and looked the best he has in a deeper role for a while. If he could do that more regularly then it would be great but i think that last half hour or so where he was the main man with kagawa behind is where we could be really dangerous and where he looked best. Looking in good shape for the start of the season.
 
Decent performance, but what a fecking embarrassing dive.

BTW: I think he's best up front with Kagawa behind him. Those 2 with Nani and Val flanking should be perfect.
Welbeck would be benched but that doesnt bother me too much. He'd still get enough time and he has still a lot of developing to do.
 
Plan M said:
If someone offered us £50 mill tomorrow for Rooney I'd bite their hand off.
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We don't want to become a selling club. It sends out the wrong message.
 
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