The Wayne Rooney Post.

Already, most Americans who don't watch soccer or ESPN and are reading this entry are going, "WHO?"

C'mon, it's already a known fact that Manchester United isn't "America's team" and that Americans refer to their version of football as the NFL. For the uninformed, I will help by filling you in on who this man is.
Music please...

Wayne Rooney, born on October 24, 1985, is a forward for the English football club Manchester United. He first made his professional debut in 2002 with Everton and quickly caught the attention of football fans around the circuit. In 2003, he joined the Manchester United squad and continued his impact on the sport. 
Since then, he has made appearances with Team England during international competition and has also won numerous titles with the Manchester United club. Despite several injuries that he has sustained, he has been very successful. So successful that he would like to move on to another club...! (End music)




Now that we've given him a decent introduction, it's high time that I explain why I'm writing about this "stud." It appears that he does not wish to continue with Manchester United and would like to leave the team. Sir Alex Ferguson, their "skipper" as you will, seems rather put aside by this because Rooney is a huge part of the team and is a huge face of the club. But this is the big deal here: according to sources, just a few months ago Rooney was in good shape with the club and claimed that he was very happy with where he was. So it feels as if he just happened to have a change of heart in a short period of time and wants to go where the grass looks much greener.

However, when he leaves, he's going to be taking assorted problems with him. He has shown that he's rather prone to injury, and has also shown that he has a bit of a temper to go around when he's provoked. But wait...there's more! He has also been under fire for allegations of infidelity and having very wayward teenage years--you know, those times when you... [Oh, how do I put this in a nicer and PG-formatted way?] would "like to experiment" and all of that business. So of course, his personal life has been a subject that the European sports media has been preying on and off of over the course of a few months (maybe even years since I don't live in the UK and almost never hear of things like this). It's hard to really take a side on this topic, because regardless of how well you know the him through watching him on television or reading an online news story, you don't exactly know him personally. And believe me, we should all know how the media likes to sensationalize certain things. Okay, he's publicly admitted that he had done some bad things when he was younger, but he's a changed man, and he's looking to fix himself, or so we think.

In the case of playing with Manchester United and now requesting to leave the team, it's like being in a failing relationship. Externally, he might really enjoy what he's doing and says that he's happy but doesn't exactly mean it. Internally, it might only be messing his focus up and decaying his happiness of not just himself, but other things that he loves outside of his profession, such as his wife and child. It would make a lot of sense if he was only saying things that people wanted him to say just to prevent any upset or false allegations of management issues or egotistical matters. Then again, he has had injury issues as of late, and his benching may have just fueled the fire on his wanting out of the club. He also has the chip on his shoulder of the creeping infidelity accusations. Heck, his request to leave the club might even be a ruse to hide something even bigger that he doesn't want to be publicized.

If I may add, Sir Alex is taking this rather well, and he's making sure that his point gets out that he's doing the best he can in order to maintain stability in the club and to prevent any massive falling out with Rooney.

If and when he leaves, he's going to be scouted by many other big-name teams in Europe like Chelsea and Real Madrid [hello, Cristiano!], and during that time he's going to attempt to get back into tip-top shape and look "nice and purdy" for the competitors. Yes, it's going to be the end of an era for a lot of people who have watched Manchester United and have seen Rooney in devil red day in and day out, but we'll have to see the outcome of what Wayne thinks is the best option for himself during these tough times.

Let's just hope he doesn't continue doing this and mess up his reputation even more:

 

--AZ