SOCCER: THE SENSE of unease affecting Wayne Rooney and Manchester United heightened last night, when the striker was ruled out of tomorrow night's Champions League match at Valencia through injury. Rooney has succumbed to an ankle problem aggravated at Bolton Wanderers on Sunday and there is no indication when he will regain full fitness.
The loss of the striker is a blow for Alex Ferguson, despite the player’s struggle with form and personal issues. United have failed to win in three away fixtures in the Premier League this season and an unconvincing 0-0 draw at home to Rangers in their opening Champions League match has lent the game at the Mestalla more significance than the manager would like so early in the campaign.
United will not be missing only Rooney against Valencia, because Ryan Giggs strained a hamstring against Bolton and is out for two weeks. Ferguson may start with Dimitar Berbatov as a lone striker for a match United dare not lose.
Rooney was substituted after 61 minutes of the 2-2 draw at the Reebok Stadium, where United twice had to come from behind. Mike Phelan, their assistant manager, revealed Rooney had been carrying the knock for “a couple of weeks”, and the fear is that his condition is more serious than thought.
If so, Rooney will be in doubt for United’s league game at Sunderland on Saturday and it might threaten his availability for England’s European Championship qualifier against Montenegro at Wembley in two weeks.
Rooney’s enforced absence adds to a wretched few months for the double footballer of the year. After his failure for England at the World Cup, it was hoped an extended holiday would provide the platform for another strong season. Rooney, though, found himself the subject of a storm of media interest over his private life, with allegations of infidelity.
It prefaced Ferguson’s decision to omit him from United’s visit to Everton, Rooney’s former club, and even prompted the manager to say last week that the negative attention had affected the forward’s performance.
Meanwhile, Nemanja Vidic has told his team-mates to cut out the defensive lapses that are wrecking their Premier League title campaign.
Defeats for Chelsea and Arsenal on Saturday should have been the start of a perfect weekend for United, who would have moved to within a point of Carlo Ancelotti’s men if they had beaten Bolton.
Instead, the problems which are proving so difficult to eradicate reared their heads again.
A combination of slack marking by Jonny Evans and Patrice Evra moving away from the post he was supposed to be defending allowed Zat Knight to put Bolton ahead.
Then, after Nani had scored a brilliant equaliser, the visitors offered Martin Petrov far too much room to exhibit his talents as he cut inside Park Ji-sung to drive a second goal beyond Edwin van der Sar.
In the end, United were lucky to have the chance of settling for a point given Johan Elmander blasted a brilliant opportunity over the bar which surely would have given Bolton victory.
Yet, while Michael Owen’s third goal in a week ensured United did not make the short journey back down the M61 empty-handed, the brutal truth is that they have now conceded nine goals in five Premier League games.
Even basement boys Everton have done better than that, while Ferguson’s men are still to record an away win in three attempts.
“It is a big concern that we are conceding so many away goals,” said Vidic. “We have to stop doing it. We cannot let it happen again.”
It hardly seems believable that the same defenders responsible for the present malaise should concede just 22 and 24 goals respectively during the entire Premier League title-winning campaigns of 2008 and 2009.
Rio Ferdinand’s absence is clearly not helping but the England skipper was also missing when United went 14 games without conceding a goal during the mid-winter of the 2008-09 campaign that also included a trip to Japan for the Club World Cup.
As the man who now wears the captain’s armband, Vidic feels the responsibility more than most.
“Over the last few years we haven’t given that many goals away or even allowed them so many chances,” he said.
“Before we have always looked strong, so this is not what we are used to.
“We have to play much better in our away games.”
Ferdinand is expected to be back for the Spain trip, which Ferguson felt was sufficiently important to miss last week’s League Cup tie against Scunthorpe in order to go on a spying mission.
With three successive goalless draws in Spain to look back on, including the 2008 semi-final against Barcelona, United do have memories of defensive solidity to fall back on, even if it goes against Ferguson’s belief that victory is essential.
In addition to getting things right at the back, Ferguson must also decide what to do with Rooney.
There must be an argument for giving the 24-year-old a complete break to give his body and mind a chance to recover from the physical and emotional trauma he has been through recently.
