Wayne Rooney v Chelsea

Continuing on from my "Returning" post, the main reason I found myself needing a blog again was the media loving of Wayne Rooney's performance last night against Chelsea.

It seems that just "putting in a shift" constitutes everything being forgotten and Rooney looking like a God of Football in the 0-0 draw last night.

Personally, what I saw was a bloke with a chip on his shoulder and a point to prove, but going about it in the wrong way. Getting plaudits for setting up 2 goals last week v Swansea obviously wasn't a big enough deal for him and he wanted to get on the scoresheet rather than simply enable others to score.

There were a few clever passes in and around the area and at times it was frustrating to watch Rooney and Co. lay it off to one another in an attempt to get through the Chelsea Bus (another blog on this soon), when everyone is screaming to take a chance.

Rooney seemed determined to score, no matter the range, amount of players in the way and seemingly forgetting he's playing against one of the best keepers in the league.

Every attempt on goal from him that I witnessed seemed to be an outside of the box hit that had no venom or guile behind it to outfox the defence or keeper.

Numerous times there was a lay off onto another player, or the option to shift it backwards to find more space, and instead Rooney got an inch and had a tame shot. I'm not against a player wanting to score in such a fashion or to get his message across, but I'd much rather see a slide-rule pass and a tap in than speculative long range shots.

So, was Rooney United's best player last night? Seemingly his work rate in the game has won him this "award" this morning, but is it anything more than anyone would expect of a top player at a top club?

It seems that needing a good talking point and narrative to the Rooney transfer saga is fuelling media talk this morning, as opposed to taking a step back and looking at the bigger picture. If Rooney had scored a brace or bagged the winner, then fair enough, but in a 0-0 draw, at home, against a team with no striker, I would have expected that workrate and ethic from any player in Red.

This isn't an agenda against Wayne Rooney - he's a fantastic player and I would love to see him stay at Manchester United (even if it is to the detriment of Shinji Kagawa). It's more the media circus around Rooney praising a player for "putting in a shift" in a game that lacked any real action or talking points (aside from Lampard's handball).

If workman-like drive was all you needed to be a World Class footballer, James Milner would have won the Ballon D'or for the last 3 seasons.

In summary: Rooney: Good. Media hype for good headlines: Bad.

SB

Returning

This morning I was happily driving along to work with no radio on. I then realised I was driving in silence and turned my radio on and found myself listening to the usual sports media garbage.

It's then I found myself thinking that I need a place to vent my opinion about sporting matters without limiting myself to 140 characters.

So here we are. No more match reviews (they took way too long anyway), just the odd opinion from an odd chap.

Hello and Welcome!

Hi there!

This is my first attempt at blogging about goings on in football* so be gentle with me...

Over the last few months I've really been enjoying my time spent on Twitter posting about football goings on, the banter, jokes and lots of things that don't get picked up on by mainstream media.

So driving into work this morning I thought to myself "I want to talk more about football. I can't be shackled by 140 characters.". And as a result, this blog was born.

It's a little bare at the moment and looks rough, but that's mostly because most of the hour it took to set up was trying to find a name that wasn't taken...

Anyway, I suppose I best give a bit of info about me. I'm 24, work in computer software and have supported Manchester United all my life. It's only in the last 6 or 7 years since I had my own freedom (and money) that I've really been able to get back into football again.

With the increase in availability of football from around the globe being streamed and recording digitally, I can watch any matches I fancy.

I'll get the first sarcastic comment out of the way now.

Yes I support Manchester United.
Yes I'm from Manchester.
No I don't have a season ticket or regularly go to games unless they're on open sale.

So yeah, armchair fan this, glory hunter that. Heard them all before.

This blog is here for me to talk casually about my opinions on what's going on in football at the moment, some thoughts after each Manchester United game and maybe some other bits and bobs.

It's not the fountain of football knowledge, and nor do I claim to be. Instead, it's just a bloke talking about his favourite hobby and team.

Feel free to comment and chip in, just keep it clean!

* I lie. I tried to blog about World Cup 2006 using Windows Live Spaces. It was horrible.