Rooney ends England's World Cup hopes
Posted by DavidM in Wayne Rooney, World Cup | 2 July 2006
So it's all over for England after yet another failure to convert penalties. At least we got them all on target this time, but we couldn't get past Ricardo and Portugal go through to meet France.
One thing all the papers agree on is that Rooney's sending off in the 62nd minute was a major turning point. England hadn't been playing fantastically well up to that point but they didn't look in danger of losing the game and on occasion threatened to create something going forward.
What the press seem to disagree about is whether Rooney should have been sent off at all. Martin Jol and Sam Allardyce don't believe it was a foul, while Terry Venables and Sir Geoff Hurst blame Rooney fair and square.
It did surprise me that after the absolute pasting Beckham got for his kick-out against Argentina in 1998, Rooney's stupidity was hardly mentioned by the commentators on the BBC. The stamp wasn't as clear cut as Beckham's lash-out, but it looked sufficiently intentional, was right in front of the referee and was followed by a push on Ronaldo (though the gobby git deserved more than that).
So Rooney passed the fitness test, but failed the temperament test. One of the world's greatest potential players let himself - and his team - down again. The Portuguese played their usual game of falling over at the slightest sign of a gentle breeze and harrassed Rooney at every opportunity. He should have had a free-kick just before his sending off and suffered again at the hands of a referee who governed according to the southern European footballing style rather than ours.
But that's no excuse. At international level that's they way things are and you have to be in control of yourself as much as the ball to succeed. Has Rooney proved that he is an excellent Premiership player but unable to perform internationally against that style of play?
