HEADING FOR A DIVORCE: Rooney and Reds are no longer United after breakdown in key relationships So how did it come to this? How did the relationship between one of the most gifted players of his generation and the most decorated club in English football turn so sour? It can be traced back to two-and-a-half years ago when Wayne Rooney first expressed a desire to leave Manchester United, questioning the club’s ambition. Back then it ended with a dramatic U-turn and a new £250,000-a-week contract. It is hard to see a similar thing happening now. Some United fans never forgave Rooney. Sir Alex Ferguson never forgot how he felt a gun was held to his head by their most influential player. It took Ferguson until last summer to address that issue.The signing of Robin van Persie from Arsenal not only strengthened United’s team, it strengthened Ferguson’s hand in how he was able to deal with Rooney. Suddenly England’s first-choice striker was being played out of position in attack — sometimes even in midfield — to accommodate Van Persie. For a player whose game has always been about goals, it was hard to stomach. Ferguson also made little secret of his concerns over Rooney’s lifestyle and how it was affecting his fitness and conditioning. Photographs of him smoking hardly endeared him to his manager. It had been an issue for some time but now the United boss was able to voice it a little more obviously, something that only irritated the player even more. It all came to a head at Old Trafford in March when Ferguson shocked the football world by dropping Rooney to the bench for the second leg of a crucial Champions League tie against Real Madrid. Two weeks earlier in the Bernabeu the striker had been an anonymous figure playing wide on the right. Former United captain Roy Keane suggested that ‘the writing was on the wall’, and he should know. It was a stunning decision and one that sent out a clear message to Rooney: he was no longer indispensable. The issue festered for the rest of the season. Rooney told Ferguson that he saw his future elsewhere and the manager further angered the player by making it public after his final home game before retiring in May. It left a delicate situation for Ferguson’s successor David Moyes. The Scot had given Rooney his first-team break at Everton in 2002 but that counted for little, with the 27-year-old reiterating his desire to leave when the two met in secret shortly after Moyes’s appointment was confirmed. Summit talks were believed to have been set up between Rooney’s advisors and new United chief Edward Woodward earlier this month but they never took place. Woodward adopted a hardline stance, insisting that United would not be forced to the negotiating table again and that no talks would take place until next summer at the earliest, when Rooney will only have 12 months left on his contract. Even then, he suggested that the club would like to see how the striker performs next season. ‘There are no contract renewals being discussed,’ said Woodward. ‘I am not sitting down with any player on an extension and there is no trigger date in the diary. Would we be afraid to run a contract down? Of course not.’ Having vowed at his unveiling as United boss that Rooney would not be sold at any price, Moyes responded to further questions on United’s tour of the Far East and Australia by saying that Rooney would be considered vital only if ‘we had an injury to Robin van Persie’. By then Rooney had flown home from Bangkok with a hamstring injury that is expected to keep him out of action for a month, but he was furious at what he heard. It was, according to one source, the tipping point. He has made it clear to the club that he has no intention of playing second fiddle to Van Persie again, playing another season out of position with the World Cup just around the corner. He also resents any suggestion that he should be on trial after nine successful years at Old Trafford. The latest developments, with Rooney repeating his desire to leave and now threatening to hand in a written transfer request, have raised the stakes dramatically. Does Moyes back down over his pledge not to sell, or offload a player who does clearly not want to be at the club any longer? Chelsea and Arsenal are monitoring events, as are Real Madrid, Barcelona and Paris Saint-Germain. There is still a glimmer of hope on both sides that it can all be turned around. But it’s difficult to see a way back this time. Wish Rooney best of luck in his decision making, but he should know that he will be more than welcome at chelsea!
Posted on: Wed, 17 Jul 2013 05:36:58 +0000
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