Rumours of Rooney torpor exaggerated

RUMOURS OF Wayne Rooney struggling for fitness have been greatly exaggerated. Either that or a rest at Molineux on Saturday did him a power of good. He was certainly fit enough to carry the United attack on his own after his alleged over-exertion on the Wembley turf for England.

Rooney was not able to manage the full Nicklas Bendtner and neither could United emulate Arsenal’s five, yet Milan are not Porto and Rooney’s double was just as impressive as the Dane’s hat-trick.

The Italians defended with surprising naivety, as well as missing a few good chances, but no one on the pitch could match Rooney for quality of movement or decisiveness of finish. Rooney settled the tie as early as the 14th minute. Everything that followed was mere decoration, though it must be said the way United opened up Milan for Rooney’s second, before he disappeared just after an hour, will have given them every encouragement for the rest of the tournament.

Having put themselves in an unassailable position in Milan it was disappointing for United to concede the late Clarence Seedorf goal that allowed the Italians to travel to Manchester with hope, but Alex Ferguson’s assessment of the situation was that if his side scored in the second leg, it ought to be enough.

There was some debate among United fans about whether Ferguson would select an attacking line-up or pack the midfield, yet the fact that Dimitar Berbatov was on the bench was somewhat misleading. The Bulgarian has been in decent form, yet his pairing with Rooney does not necessarily constitute United’s strongest attacking line-up. Most of the unstoppable performances Rooney has put in this year were a result of playing on his own, and the 3-2 victory at San Siro was achieved with a similar formation to the one Ferguson employed here.

Rooney clearly enjoys the freedom and responsibility of having the top half of the field to himself, even if he still runs about more and drops back deeper for the ball than he claims.

Predictably Rooney had the first shot of the game, the first couple of shots actually, though Ronaldinho also came close with a header at the other end and the match was still waiting for its all-important first score. United found inspiration from an entirely unexpected source.

Gary Neville was in the side for his experience, Ferguson putting a high value on the commodity for big European nights, though having seen him struggle against Matt Jarvis in the 45 minutes he played at Wolves on Saturday the United support was fearful of what might happen when he was asked to contain Ronaldinho.

They need not have worried. Neville took it on himself to get forward and cause Milan problems. He had already sent a dipping shot narrowly over the bar and won a commanding header on halfway by the time he sauntered down the right and sent over the cross from which Rooney opened the scoring.

It was not the sort of cross that required only contact – Rooney was some way out and had to demonstrate technique and accuracy – but it was an ideal cross in that it went straight to the England striker and gave him a chance to beat Daniele Bonera to the ball, which he did.

Milan have no excuse for not knowing about Rooney’s heading ability after San Siro, so perhaps they assumed he would not be able to leap so high or beat Christian Abbiati from 12 yards. Rooney turned a good cross into a great goal with a header from the days when centre fowards had centre partings.

Even more remarkably, for a player with much more to his all-round game who has only recently begun to display the positional sense and timing to make heading an effective part of his repertoire, it was Rooney’s seventh consecutive headed goal. Any old-fashioned centre forward would have been proud to make that boast.

While United held a one-goal lead the tie was still theoretically open, but the second half was barely a minute old before Rooney struck again. Taking advantage of a sprint down the left by Nani and a perfectly judged pass inside, Rooney reached the ball ahead of Abbiati and applied a gentle first-time nudge to push it into the net. Game over, with due respect to the goals by Park Ji-sung and Darren Fletcher and David Beckham’s well-received though fruitless introduction.

Rooney’s sequence of headed goals was over too, though that is hardly important when a scorer is in such imperious form. While Beckham crossed well and rolled back the years with one spectacular volley that almost caught Edwin van der Sar off guard, he no longer has the ability to influence outcomes single-handed. United and England now have someone else who can do that.