37 thoughts on “Is there a secret deal between Rooney and United?

  1. Exactly what I’ve been saying to my friends recently. Rooney signed a deal so United didn’t lose value in the transfer market – Rooney appreciates all that United and Fergie have done for him and he didn’t want to screw us over.

    All theories of course, but made sense to me!

  2. Perhaps your ‘theory’ could be taken a step further.
    Should WR go to RM, not make the grade, and then return to the EPL, UTD could not stop him from signing for City.
    However if UTD and Fergie have a dossier on his extra-marital sex activities, other than the Thompson affair, and they threaten to ‘let the NOTW’ find it by accident should he ever sign for City, then even a dunce such as WR would realise the implications.

  3. Actually, you pretty well hit on the head my own thinking on the matter. Even though I’m not American, I happen to have lived in the States for the last 10 years or so, and it’s a very common practice over here for players to get involved in sign and trade deals, which isn’t too dissimilar to what you’re talking about with Rooney. Difference over here it that it’s part of the structure in sports like basketball, whereas such a deal in British football would much more unique.

    The way the whole thing played out, particularly the abrupt about face and Fergie’s acquiescence, smelt fishy, but then maybe I’m just getting too cynical in my old age! Fact is that United were going to lose out big time by letting him go in January only 18 months out from a Bosman. Getting him to sign off on generous new terms, and working on the basis that he felt SOME loyalty to the team, creates a scenario where he gets what he wants – a move away – while United gain maximum value for him. Both parties win – as do the fans, or at least some of us! Personally, I’d be happy to see the back of Rooney – I happen to think he’s the most over-hyped and over-rated player of his generation. Running up and down the pitch and giving your all for the cause are admirable traits, but they do not denote class.

    Take the money and put it into one or two classy midfielders. That’s where United desperately need shoring up, not up front. We all love Scholesy, but it’s a sad indictment of how little pressure is coming through from others that United keep relying on his old legs, week in and week out, to hold up the fort for the team. He’d be of much greater value coming off the bench in important games and giving is 20 – 30 minute cameo performances that allow him to show off his skills without wearing him out.

  4. @ffan, you’re absolutely right of course, United will not be able to stop Rooney from ending up at Eastlands from some other club but it somehow won’t seem to be as bad as virtually crossing the road from Old Trafford. My gut feeling is that he will eventually end up back home at Everton.

  5. Have smelt a rat for a while now. Can’t help but feel there’s something not quite right about the whole Rooney saga. Definitely think he’s off in the not too distant future.

  6. @timbo, you seem to have a good knowledge of sports in the USA. I often wondered what they use in place of our transfer system. We never seem to hear of big transfer fees paid for players over there. Can you shed any light on it?

  7. You may be right on the money ISHAN and I could be way off the mark. What I cannot get my head around is a 25 year old who was barely out of his nappies when Ferguson took over at Old Trafford, telling the great man that the players he brought to the club are not good enough to challenge for honours, get his act together and bring in some quality ones – otherwise he’s off. Nobody but NOBODY lectures Sir Alex in that fashion and get away with it. But then again, Ferguson may have mellowed in his old age…and pigs might fly!

  8. I think this is the most accurate assessment of the situation that you can arrived at.

    Fuck off fat boy.

  9. hah! having a theory is one thing, but this is far from the range of believable situations. there is just a simple fact to this. he is being kept away to give him time to sort out and deal with his emotional and mental discomforts. we do not ‘need’ him right now, the way we did at the end of last season.. so why not give him some time off?

    he wont be sold this january. i dont believe it will happen, the way things are going. however, unexpected often becomes reality in football. thats why it is exciting.

  10. I think you’re on to the gist of somet’, but I’m not sure that his price is going up while he plays in Colorado and(I’m told) Nevada. Moneybags Real Madrid might well do a really worthwhile swap and cash deal with United, but surely they’re not going to piss away 100M quid on someone who hasn’t kicked a football with any sense of true purpose since the second Bayern ECC game. Doesn’t make sense NOT to play him.

  11. warms my heart to see you tw4ts turning on your own (slightly soiled) heroes. Why would anyone want to leave a massive club where the fans demonstrate outside your house, issue death threats and turn on you at the first sign of something going tilt. you lot and trafford rovers deserve each other. i just hope ferguscumm lives to see it all go tilt and the bailiffs arrive. never mind, you’ll be able to switch to the real united by then.

  12. I for one have no problems Rooney going to City — as long as we can extract maximum value out of the deal, which is most likely with City. It will just go hand in hand with the rest of the mercenaries that they have there at the moment. Most apt.

  13. It has crossed my thinking as well.
    It very well could be possible that he could leave in jan or jun. Ssn sports showd some pics of wr10 training by himself in the us.he was able to kick footballs just fine.

  14. Who cares? He’s shit, your shit, end of.
    He wont be sold untill the summer, if somebody actually wants to buy him.
    As for your new savior Javior “chichorito” mexican shite Hernandez, he scores 3 tap ins and suddenly hes better than Messi. Your shit fans really do know how to over-hype and over-rate players cor.

    P.S. “Your shit and Rooney said you are!”

  15. SHAME ON YOU ALL !!!! but makes me so glad ., what comes around etc, coleen will never leave the northwest, oh ! thanks for the cencorship too !!! LFC YNWA

  16. @Frank As an American, I’ll shed some light for you on how it works over here. To be honest with you, the whole transfer fee deal is a completely foreign concept over here. With many sports, there are only three ways to acquire players: through the college draft, trades, or free agency.

    Trades are usually done as a player-for-player type deal. If the player is a highly touted player than it may take 2, 3, or even 4 players to trade for that one quality talent. In a trade there are no transfer fees, instead teams have a tendency to dump salary if they need to. The way organizations work over here is that they try to cut the amount of money wasted on their own teams (however there will always be exceptions, Yankees, Red Sox) instead of trying to extricate it from other clubs.

    Timbo is exactly right about the sign-and-trade. It is a very common practice in the NBA. It would be just like shipping off Rooney in the Jan. transfer window because then United would get the maximum amount of value and the team that receives him would get a contract that guarantees his services for a set amount of time.

    Also, teams don’t loan out players over here. When you have a contract with a team, you are stuck with that team and their development system until either the contract runs out (free agency), the player is cut (again free agency), and they are traded.

    I hope this cleared some of the basic stuff up and I didn’t sound like a retarded American in the process.

  17. I may be new to this board, but it seems like there are a lot of trolls (Sean, Joe Madigan, tublu) on here. Remember not to feed the trolls, it only gives them more reason to write incoherent babble and assassinate the english language with their egregious use of exclamation points.

  18. Many thanks Troy, your explanation has helped me to understand how it’s done in the States. There are still some further questions however. 1 – If two clubs agree to trade a player, what happens if the player refuses to be part of that trade? 2 – Is the club that he is traded to obliged to carry on paying the player no less than the amount he was earning at his original club? 3- Are there windows like the winter and summer ones in football when trades can be done or are there no restrictions? Thanks again Troy and don’t worry, you were very articulate in your explanation. You can also ignore those ‘trolls’ as you call them, they exist in every club.

  19. @Frank 1. In American sport, when a player signs a contract he can negotiate what is called a “no trade clause” into the contract. What this means is that a player can veto a trade to a club if he doesn’t want to go. This is usually the case with top performers at clubs. Most clubs won’t grant this clause to lesser or role players. If a player does not have a no trade clause, he cannot veto a trade, however he can try to refuse to play for the team that he is traded to. Although this usually makes for a messy situation and makes the player (instead of the club) look bad, thus it doesn’t happen often.

    2. You are correct. When a team trades for a player, they in essence buy the contract as is. They can try to restructure the deal, but this usually means that the club tries to pay the player less, and the player usually refuses. For example, San Diego Chargers running back LaDainian Tomlinson is one of the great running backs in American football history, however, last year the Chargers believed that his skills had declined to the point where they wanted to restructure his contract not once, but twice. The first time he agreed, but after they asked a second time in order to bring him back for this season, Tomlinson took offense and signed with the New York Jets as a free agent.

    3. There are transfer windows, but we call them trading deadlines. For example in baseball, the window opens a couple days after the World Series (in early November) and goes through July 31 every year. After July 31, players cannot be traded (they still can but its a really convoluted process) until November again. When basketball and hockey season ends in May, the same thing happens, but for those sports the deadline is in mid-February. This is obviously different than football because there is only one window, however, that window is far wider than in football, sometimes lasting up to 8 months.

    Again prior to these deadlines, there are no restrictions (unless a player has a no trade clause).

  20. I really hope this isn`t the case.

    We all see how important Rooney is for us on the pitch. This season we haven`t played good attacking football, at least not in the way we`re used to see United.

    I ofcourse agree that what he did was fucked up, and I`m not forgiving that. But hearing about this Paul Stretford, I can`t see he didn`t made this happen. Rooney has, by his own faults, been under a lot of pressure from media and his personal life lately. And on top of that played shit in the end of last season, int the wordl cups, and the few matches he has played this season. He must have been on a low confidence wise, and I assume Stretford made all of this situation to earn himself some million pounds. As well I read that Stretford is a good pal of the person in shitty dealing with transfers. Also Rooney isn`t the smartest kid, so i guess it wasn`t hard turning him around when your`e a cynical cunt like Stretford. You read peoples opinion about hims, as Cole, and you understand how the guy is like.

    That do not excuse Rooney for what he did, but giving the situation as a whole I think he did something he regrets deeply.

    That said if this are a deal made by the club and Rooney/Stretord I`m utterly disapointed. I really hope Rooney will stay, and sho on the pitch an attitude we`ve never seen before.
    Okey Rooney will never be a legend. We`re not as the scouse, who seems to forget about Gerrard and his transfer request. But if he reckon he did a big mistake, stays, and is comitted on the pitch delivering good displays and goals we should back him up. As for all he is a United player for now.

    We need Rooney back on the pitch to win trophies this season. Lets instead mock him if he is to leave, not at the time he still is a United player, at least not when he is on the pitch.

  21. Rooney not destined for City, seems there is a deal for Torrez who they consider a better prospect with less baggage

  22. Just a suggestion Mr Madigan. You should sober up before coming on here, writing garbage which makes you look like an absolute tool.

  23. Sorry Joe, you’re giving Scousers a worse name than they already have. For their sake, any future comments from you will not see the light of day. Now go have another of whatever you’re on.

  24. I have it from a very good source that Rooney has fallen into the same trap as his good friend Ricky Hatton. Truth is that Rooney has a cocaine addiction and has been sent to America for an intensive rehab session!!

  25. What a pity Frank, such a mature argument then you have to go and spoil it all by reverting to type and start insulting Liverpool. I suggest you look up the national crime figures before the condescending remarks. Sadly most of you on this and other Utd websites don’t have the intelligence to look beyond the stereotypes. By the way Joe was right, you lot had no issue with Rooney crapping all over my club that had nurtured him from the age of eight nor the repugnant Stretford that manoevred his sale to your club nor where Rooney came from when he was producing the goods.Utter hypocrisy!!!!
    One further thing Frank, I am sure Rooney was advanced for his age even as a baby but he was only 13 months old when Ferguson took over hardly old enough to be out of nappies. Oh and no we don’t want him back.

  26. Apologies if you were offended by my comment Gareth. Unfortunately Scousers DO have a bad name overall whether I agree with it or not. I happen to believe that they are no better and no worse than anyone else. It was not meant to be insulting because we don’t believe that there’s a need for them here. That’s was all Joe Madigan was throwing in his four or five contributions however and in the end, enough was enough. I’m not sure what you mean by your comment about Rooney only being 13 months old when Ferguson took over. Not that it’s so important but the fact that he was barely out of his nappies has already been made in an earlier response to one of the contributors.

  27. @mikekelly12. That’s sad IF TRUE Mike. I just hope that you’re not unwittingly spreading unfounded rumours

  28. the picture between fergie and rooney after he signed. They ain’t that good at acting!!…. and the whole Rooney in America thing is just Fergie taking him out of the spotlight seeing as the opportunity has presented itself with him being injured. Killing two birds so to speak… Your theory would surely be looked upon as a major betrayal by everyone involved..

  29. Many thanks for the reply Frank, much appreciated and best of luck for the rest of the season obviously apart from the return game at OT in the new year!

  30. I am going with the cocaine theory

    and this story of a “secret deal” seems very plausable …

    for weeks rooney was upset and pointing out that he had no injuries whatsoever and was upset about fergie saying he was “hurt” during the whole “I’m leaving saga”

    then “booom”

    a 5 year deal is signed .. he’s is concurring w/ fergie that he is hurt, goes off to dubai or soemthing .. comes back (should be in the side earning his $ at this point) but no then he is sent of to the usa for training ????

    He must be hangin with becks trying to figure out what life after united is like

  31. I belive the reason why WR gets a new contract and get to stay in United after disrespecting SAF is that WR says what everyone else can see. United cant buy the world class players that are awailable. And for SAF to say that he doesnt see any quality and moneyworth players in the marked is down right bullsh*t! Özil, Van der Vaart where both awailable for the same price we bought Bebe. And they DONT need 3-4 years before they can do a job for United and lift the team

    No I think the reason why WR is staying is becaus SAF sees this him self, but have to stay loyal to the Glazers. Yeah he would bring in a lot of money, but then we would sell the last one WORLD CLASS player in our squad!

    And nobody can blaime the lad for being a “rocket scientist”! Mayby this outburst is just “one for the can”.

Comments are closed.