Take A Bow, Wayne Rooney

The problem with numbers is that, as a means of conveyance, they can flatten facts.

Take, for example, Wayne Rooney’s 250 goals for Manchester United.

Perhaps because it’s been built up for so long, perhaps because Messrs Messi and Ronaldo seem to score that many per season these days, perhaps because it’s Wayne, the number and the scale of his achievement seems to have been diluted.

The whole point of football is to unite ball and net. Be it by wallop, caress, nut, bludgeon, stroke or waft, the aim of the game is to put the little white thing inside the big white thing. Wayne has done that 250 times, more than any other of the 899 players to have represented Manchester United and Newton Heath over the last 139 years.

Scoring a goal is something that can be done fairly readily – goalkeeper Alex Stepney managed it twice – but those 899 players have included Denis Law, Ruud van Nistelrooy and Dennis Viollet; players who have been seemingly helpless to stop scoring at various points in their careers. The ranks also include the seemingly interminable attacking of Sir Bobby Charlton, Ryan Giggs and Paul Scholes. Throw in Best, Ronaldo, Cantona, Taylor, Herd, Solskjaer, Cole and countless others, and you get the picture: Rooney hasn’t just strolled to the front of a short queue, he’s had to graft his way past a cavalcade of genuine greats.

And in doing so, he’s massively impacted on Manchester United’s fortunes. Those 250 goals have come in 189 games, 164 of which have been victories. Six of the remaining goals – including Saturday's record-breaker at Stoke and the Ewood Park penalty which confirmed a 19th league title – have directly clawed United back from a losing position, and just 14 goals have come in defeats. He’s broken the deadlock in 82 previously goalless games.

He’s scored in every round of the Champions League, every round of the FA Cup except the final, two League Cup finals and semi-finals, the Club World Cup final and semi-final. He has scored in 46 different stadia, across 14 different countries, against 94 different goalkeepers and 98 different managers.

The numbers all add up to one, indisputable fact: Wayne Rooney is due a serious outpouring of respect, something which hasn’t been afforded to him much in recent years. The reaction after his record-equalling goal against Reading earlier this month was incredible. Firstly, there was the furore over his attempts to swap shirts with Royals defender George Evans, who preferred to do so in the Old Trafford tunnel out of respect for the travelling supporters. Secondly, as understandable a segue as it was for Jose Mourinho to be asked about Marcus Rashford’s two goals in the same game, it was staggering to see the next day’s headlines already intimating that Rooney's share in the record was under threat from the 19-year-old. Rashford’s is a rare and joyous talent, but even the teenager himself is already wise enough to recognise that such speculation is premature and disrespectful.

The media’s interest in Rooney is a curious issue. When discussing his career, his former colleagues, coaches and managers invariably add how much more impressive his achievements are for taking place before a backdrop of unyielding scrutiny, all the while conducted with that exceedingly British inclination to knock down what has been built up.

Wayne has been in the public eye since his mid-teens, meaning virtually half of his life has been played out before an audience. In the same way that the long-retired Paul Gascoigne is still front-page news, perhaps there is some residual resentment that Rooney has not, as widely hoped when he first emerged, led a golden age of English talent to international glory. It’s not like, having also clambered atop England’s all-time scoring chart, he hasn’t held up his end of the bargain.

There is also an air of apparent annoyance that Rooney has changed as a player over time. He emerged in his teens as the realist’s daydream; unfathomably gifted, but tirelessly working away in some relentless, snarling battle against anything at all, including himself. Over a dozen or so years punctuated by coaching, maturity, injuries and positional sacrifice for the greater good, the teen tempest has become the clean-cut leader. Halfway through his United career, he became too important to the cause to be risking injury or suspension, so his game was forced to evolve in the name of functionality and common sense.

Most players don’t have good enough careers to retain relevance and hold interest long enough for their changes to matter to the public, but change is something which befalls even the greats. By the end of his career, Bryan Robson had gone from a box-to-box player to a holding midfielder. So too had Roy Keane, who instead learnt to utilise the exuberance of Darren Fletcher to vicariously cover every blade of grass.

When Ryan Giggs burst onto the scene in 1991, his game was built on a sprinter’s pace. By his own admission, he didn’t run flat out past his 21st birthday for fear of aggravating his hamstrings. Instead he used his other skills to remain influential for another decade or two.

The great young players around now will not be the same in 10 years. The 2026/27 Premier League won’t feature Rashford, Dele Alli or Raheem Sterling scorching turf all over the field. Rooney may cut a drastically different on-field persona these days, but he has remained important to United through personal and collective change, through good times and bad. He was David Moyes’ best player and was influential enough for Louis van Gaal to name him club captain – a role which he performs quietly but impressively behind the scenes.

As a presence around the Aon Training Complex, Rooney is there for everybody, be they young players in need of professional guidance or staff members going through a rough time in their personal lives. While we’re on generosity of spirit, he’s also supportive of great causes. Money isn’t something he particularly needs more of, but he certainly isn’t obliged to be as generous as he is with it. The proceeds from his summer testimonial - £1.2million – was this week split four ways between children’s charities.

Not that any of this comes into Jose Mourinho’s thinking when he names his matchday squads. Neither Rooney's philanthropy nor his 245 goals of seasons past are relevant when assessing a squad from which established internationals are forced to depart in search of first-team selection. The standards required at United under Mourinho are clear and Rooney is involved on merit. Just as Giggs and Paul Scholes were carefully managed in the second half of their careers, so too Rooney will be as he meanders further into his 30s.

Wayne first openly spoke about aiming to become United’s record goalscorer after hitting a hat-trick in 2011’s 8-2 win over Arsenal. The subsequent wait has potentially diluted the appreciation of the achievement, but that wait is over and the record is now his. He has realised his greatest individual aim mere months after completing his set of domestic club honours. There is nothing left for him to prove, history is all out of retorts to his greatness and perhaps now he will get the recognition and respect befitting a player who has cordoned off a unique achievement.

250 goals is an almighty number, but so much more besides.

The views expressed in this article are personal to the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Manchester United FC.

Credit: Manutd.com