Once a Blue, Always a Blue!
Manchester United have endured a mixed season with the club sacking Jose Mourinho in December as their season teetered on the brink. The arrival of Ole Gunnar Solskjaer has brought about renewed confidence in the club as the club look to make a last-ditch move into the top four.
The MLS is still buzzing from the latest transfer window where the League broke its record of highest transfer received with the sale of Miguel Almiron from Atlanta to Newcastle United. The transfer of Almiron created a lot of publicity in the MLS and England for various reasons.
BT Sport brings in Wayne Rooney as a pundit the first match of Ole Gunnar Solskjaer. He is currently in the offseason of MLS but being a studio guest is something he is enjoying as well. The pundit team of BT Sport will bring him in along with others to witness this game. Jose Mourinho sacked at the beginning of this week, Solskjaer has been appointed in his place by United to take on managing the team. Being a legend of Old Trafford, Solskjaer is expected to bring in good influence on the team.
Wayne Rooney has stated that he feels honored to make the final appearance as an England player. Also, he expresses his gratitude for manager Gareth Southgate for deciding his playtime against the United States. The former star from Manchester United interview and showed his excitement earning the 120th cap for his team at the farewell match. This was a friendly match against the US at Wembley Stadium.
Manchester United legend Wayne Rooney has denied claims that he would return to Europe for some more action during the Major League Soccer off-season. The former England skipper has been prolific since moving to the United States to feature for DC United.
Former Manchester United star Wayne Rooney believes Juventus should have a strong chance of winning the Champions League this term, now that Cristiano Ronaldo has joined them. The Portuguese superstar made the shock move to the Bianconeri from Real Madrid last month and there has since been plenty of talk of Juventus’ European prospects.
The continental body for football in Europe, UEFA, is reportedly planning video access for medical staff so they could review potential concussions. This is part of the post Champions League blues that has continued even as the World Cup draws nigh.
The new system being proposed would allow medical staff on the sidelines review potential concussions, which is similar to the Head Injury Assessment in the Rugby Union. The Premier League has been tackling the issue of concussion over the years. They became the first league in 2016 to allow tablets access so staff could review potentially disturbing incidents. UEFA is now towing that path.
The updated UEFA guidelines in 2014 allows a game to be stopped for up to three minutes so medical staff could do a head injury assessment and decide if a player can continue. Head injury experts have been pursuing for more attention to head injuries. The Medical team that assessed Karius post Champions League final said it was possible that the collision with Ramos affected Karius. There have been continued reactions with the way the game ended, with discussions about the mistakes still on.
Meanwhile Ramos, who is twice the villain now as he was accused to have intentionally dislocated the shoulder of Mohammed Salah or at least seeking to intentionally hurt him, and making Karius concussed, has responded to the claims. The Spain captain said the claims were outlandish.
“I see the play well, he grabs my arm first and I fell to the other side, the injury happened to the other arm and they said that I gave him a judo hold. After the goalkeeper said that I dazed him with a clash. I am only missing Firmino saying that he got a cold because a drop of my sweat landed on him.”
Firmino responded from a pre-World Cup training camp in London, labeling Ramos as “an idiot” for such claims. Others have also waded in like Chelsea and Belgium keeper Thibaut Courtoiswho said he doubts the concussion stories as it seemed Liverpool were making excuses for the defeat. He explained that within the space that Karius made the mistakes, he also made two amazing saves.
For now Liverpool have responded by adding players and trying to increase their squad depth ahead of the new season as they continue the search for a title under Jurgen Kloop.
Some people might have started counting Wayne Rooney as veteran now, but, the Red Devils skipper proved in the game against the Queens Park Rangers yesterday that he is still quicker than many of the youngsters in the team.
Rooney was, in fact, the quickest man on the park for United that day. His speed was recorded about 20.3 miles per hour on one occasion.
Some of the other Manchester United players including their new signing Angel Di Maria also crossed that 20-mile mark, but, none of them was as fast as Rooney according to the speed-gun.
Di Maria, one of the club’s expensive buys, has been bought specifically because of his speed and he did a fairly good job playing in his first home game, but, he remained a touch behind Rooney speed wise.
Manchester United has paid as much as 60 million Pounds for Di Maria and he has shown in his first couple of games that he is a player worth that many bucks. It’s still too early though to pass a judgement on him, but, he has impressed people with the looks of him. He is a tremendously skilled player who can rip through opposition defences in top form.
As far as Rooney is concerned, he looked in great touch too against QPR. He was one of the scorers in the game for the hosts and with that goal; he got to the third position in the list of the highest goal scorers in the Premier League. He is currently levelled with Thierry Henry with 175 strikes.
Out of those 175 goals of Rooney, 160 have come for Manchester United, while, 15 came for his previous club Everton.
Rooney has more than 350 premier league appearances to his name.
The new boss of Manchester United, Louis Van Gaal, will take charge from tomorrow and he will have to make a big call straightaway. He will have to select one out of the Red Devils’ two biggest players i.e. Wayne Rooney and Robin Van Persie for the captaincy post which has become vacant after the departure of Nemanja Vidic.
Rooney is understood to be willing for the armband and rightly so. For more than a decade now, he has been a great servant for the club winning matches in all competitions.
But, most of the people would admit that after the arrival of Van Persie, Rooney’s stardom at Old Trafford has reduced just a little bit. He has started playing wide now or in the midfield in an attacking role with the role of the central striker now being played by RVP.
In the last season, there were even talks of Rooney’s transfer. He eventually didn’t go though and agreed to sign the contract extension, but, it’s clear that his association with the club now is not as strong as it was a few years ago.
As far as Van Persie is concerned, he has earned the respect of almost everybody at United in just two years. Apart from being a highly skilled player, he is a fantastic leader and he showed that in the recently played World Cup where he was the captain of the Netherlands national side. He is believed to be someone who is very good at keeping the team together.
It’s all up to Van Gaal now. Whether he gives Rooney the armband for all his contributions for Man U over the years or he decides to back Van Persie to do the job, it would be very interesting to see.
Wayne Rooney is famously regarded as one of the best things to come out of the Everton youth academy, but Everton manager Roberto Martinez claims that midfielder Ross Barkley could be an even better prospect. Barkley is currently playing for Everton after having come through the ranks at the club. However, his impressive run of form in the last few years and the talent that he has shown during this period has propelled him into being one of the top transfer targets for big clubs like Chelsea and Manchester City. Manchester United are also thought to be interested in him.
Rooney came through the Everton Academy and went on to complete a £ 30 million transfer to Manchester United in 2004. He is regarded as one of the best England players out there. Martinez has seen Barkley from close quarters since the start of the season and he says that the midfielder has been demonstrating much better potential than Rooney did at a similar age. Despite the transfer interest, Barkley has been consistently stating that he wants to remain at Everton for a considerable amount of time.
Everton are close to completing a miracle push for the top four places and Champions League football next season could make Barkley commit to a new contract.
“Ross is the best young England talent I have ever seen, for sure. For me, yes [better than Rooney],” said Martinez when asked about his star midfielder. Everton’s Leon Osman was also of the same opinion and he said that Barkley could be a star at the World Cup 2014. “Should Ross get picked for the World Cup? If he gets the call, I’m absolutely convinced he will do very well. If he has the belief behind him, who knows what could happen on the bigger stage?” said Osman.