The World Cup has been thrills and spills so far.
Minnows picking up shock results, giants stumbling and in some cases falling, ridiculously good goals as well as plain ridiculous ones and nonsense red cards have all been a part of the tournament but looking at the games, groups and results, United players have not fared particularly well at all!
It began with Nani who didn’t even make it to the tournament, pulling out with an injured shoulder amidst rumours of falling out with staff and missed drug tests and it’s been down hill from there.
Patrice Evra’s France have disappointed, eliminated at the first hurdle. Video leaked of Evra having a bust up with coaching staff and despite being captain the left back was dropped for the final game against South Africa. France were always in a volatile position and it had threatened to boil over before the tournament had even started with William Gallas sulking about Evra being made captain. Dissent in the camp has spilled onto the pitch thus Evra has been made to look incompetent as captain as his team face the indignation of being eliminated at the group stages.
Being that I’m talking from an English perspective probably the biggest story will be Wayne Rooney. The striker was in fantastic form coming into the competition and scored a career best 34 goals during the season. But as the competition neared and the nation crossed it’s fingers that nothing would happen to Rooney, he picked up an ankle injury and it’s pretty much been down hill since then.
I am firmly in the belief that Rooney rushing back from the injury to help United pick up honours has been to his detriment and in my opinion he hasn’t looked anywhere near as lively or happy playing for England scoring just once since the injury. There was the furore that his temper would boil over at the World Cup and it would cost the team. So much was made of this that it lead me to believe that if any thing went wrong with England’s World Cup campaign it would lead to Rooney being made the scape goat and true to this the News of The World set about claiming the team had turned on the ‘petulant’ Wayne Rooney following England’s draw with Algeria. There is an argument for and against Rooney’s outburst after that match but believe me when I say that it will be the main talking point if England fail to triumph over Slovenia tomorrow.
Nemanja Vidic’s Serbia are looking in a good position and a victory over Australia should see them through but even he has had his moments when he decided to give away a penalty against Germany in his last game whilst Park Ji Sung’s South Korea can progress to the second round with a victory over Nigeria despite seeing his side canned 4-1 by Argentina.
In reality this is an indication of what a difference it makes being at United. Rooney has suffered from a lack of service, the kind of service he gets from Giggs and Scholes and Valencia on the wing, the kind of service Lennon, Wright-Phillips and co can’t replicate as they continually run into cul de sacs. There is a lack of harmony amongst the French and even a lack of respect for Domenech (who is undoubtedly whatless), the kind you wouldn’t see at Old Trafford as a manager like Sir Alex commands respect and would have curbed any problem the second it arose.
So far the tournament hasn’t really gone the way of any of our players would have liked but there is still hope for some and if it doesn’t we benefit anyway as they get to come home early and prepare for this coming season.
