It has now become a custom to link any star player with other sides if he has missed few of the important games and it holds specifically true with English clubs where fans want their players to play each game and deliver too.
This is something that seems to be happening with Manchester United and its captain Wayne Rooney who was not seen in last two games and absence of any player of his caliber is easily taken as the result of growing dissent between player and the management hence it is assumed he would have been looking for an alternate and as far Rooney is concerned, few media houses recently hinted he could have been looking for other options if Portuguese keeps an ignorance on him. However, club top management has denied of anything like this happened to the Three Lions skipper and they explained Rooney did not play in last few games for his calf complaint. Knowingly, 31-year-old, in this season, has started in five of the seven games for club and country as a substitute while earlier he used to be member of first eleven.
Reacting over media reports that Rooney could be joining another side, United boss called them ‘not true at all’ while answering the questions about how long will he keep playing for the side, 53-year-old said, “I don’t know. With 31, I know he can. I know he can, I know he’s a top player, I know he can play at the top level. I cannot make this kind of mental exercise of what is going to happen at 32, 3, 4, 5. I can’t say that. What I can say is that he’s a very good player, he’s a very important player for us, he’s going nowhere. We like him, he likes us.
“He is not happy because in the last matches he was on the bench, but I think he’s even unhappier when he’s not on the bench because he’s been injured and has to stay in the stands. There is no problems at all.’ He’s my captain. He is the team captain. He behaves like that. In all my career I had just a couple of players that didn’t want to play and sometimes they want to hide when things got hotter. Apart from that, every player wants to play and I don’t know players that are happy when they don’t play.
“They are always unhappy when they don’t play. Thanks for that because that is exactly the way I want it.’”
Wayne Rooney: Mitch Gunn / Shutterstock.com