Rooney to have United’s testimonial next summer

Big stars are known for their genericity and longest association playing for a side and when we are talking about who has the guts to help the needy, English players come on the top. Manchester United captain Wayne Rooney could be the next one after David Beckham to do the honor for needy people as reported by the leading sports daily. According to club insides, United will be hosting a testimonial to honor its skipper’s twelve years association with the club and Rooney, reportedly wants to celebrate his longest association with a friendlier primarily with Everton. Proceeds coming out of the game will be given to a number of charities who have long been associated with number of good causes including club’s own charity arm: The Manchester United foundation. This is noteworthy that 30-year-old is not in good form these days and manager van Gaal not even wants to talk about his form showing great respect for the Three Lions skipper. Reacting over the testimonial news, Rooney showed his pleasure being so honored by the club and said, “I would like to thank everyone involved in making this testimonial become a reality. Most of all I want to thank the fans for all their incredible support for me and the team since I joined the club.

“The match night will obviously be special for me and my family but I hope it will be a night of celebration for all involved and that we can also deliver one or two surprises. Most of all I hope the fans will come out in force and help raise as much money as possible for these amazing charities, all of which are very close to my heart for different reasons.”

Close club insiders also claim that Rooney wants Cristiano Ronaldo to play for his former side, though, nothing official has until been revealed either from Red Devils or from Ronaldo, but it looks like Portuguese would play in the game for obvious reasons. Club vice chairman Ed Woodward said talking about the friendlier, “I am delighted that United fans will be able to celebrate Wayne’s amazing years at the club in this way.

“From his sensational debut hat-trick to the latest of his 236 goals, he has been a central figure in what has been one of the most successful periods in the club’s history, winning everything from the Club World Cup, through to the Champions League and League Cup to his five Premier League titles. Wayne has selected good causes very close to his heart and the club is delighted to play its part, in providing Old Trafford as a fitting stage for such a game.”

Arsenal on the top of the league table, Wenger hails his team

Arsenal-FC

On one side, when Chelsea is struggling to even secure a position among top four, Arsenal seem to be doing a complete reversal to its last season show. Arsene Wenger side touched the peak of the year after a 2-1 win against Everton this Saturday and this is the first time they have sensed the fragrance of the top leaderboard position passing Manchester City who is close to them and can even overtook them if they could win today’s game against Manchester United. Until then, Wenger has all the reasons to celebrate his best show in many seasons for Emirate side. The joy is tripled with the fact that Gunners are behaving like winners in Champions league as well where they just defeated Bundesliga champions Bayern Munich to secure a top group position. Talking about the last game and how it rejuvenated team moral to a new high, 66-year-old Frenchman said, “At 2-1 we became a bit edgy. We gave a lot on Tuesday night and I thought it showed in the last 20 minutes. We couldn’t score the third goal and Everton had chances — it could have gone both ways.

“When you win such a big game like they did on Tuesday it shows a lot about the mentality of your team. That’s why I’m very proud of my team because they’ve shown the ability to refocus. We have a lot of questions about our strikers but Theo Walcott is outstanding and Olivier Giroud is outstanding at the moment. We’ll keep our humility and our desire to grow. We lost our first game of the season at the Emirates and no one would say we would be top of the table after that. He (Mesut Ozil) is a top class player, honestly. Rather than talking about him I would rather watch him again.”

Having been on cloud nine after last few games, Wenger added, “It’s been a great week and it was a difficult and important game today and you have to refocus. We’ve done very well against a very good Everton side. the second half we could have scored five goals but also it could have ended up 2-2, and I’m happy with my save to help us get three points.”

Regardless of the result, Everton’s performance can never be ruled out, in fact, they kept hunting for an equalizer and even got few opportunities, like Romelu Lukaku’s free header that hit the bar, but could not capitalize on any.

Wenger on cloud nine after defeating Bayern Munich in the Champions League

If your fate is shaking in European, Premier, or in any league for that matter, even a single win can triple not only your confidence but whole team feels completely revitalized that helps them secure good score in upcoming games, and it seems to be holding true for Arsenal who has recently been struggling to stage a good show in both domestic as well European leagues. Their last Champions League showdown against Bayern Munich was one such game that was almost invincible on paper for the Gunners especially after their shoddy form in league season. But their emphatic 2-0 win against visitors at home took manager Arsene Wenger on cloud nine and he starts praising everything about his side specifically Olivier Giroud and Mesut Ozil show who netted one goal each in the latter half of the game. Had it been any other side, this win would have not meant that much as it is now being seen since German side is in brilliant form these days hence no one had expected them to face a clean sweep by English club.

Wenger played with the same lineup that he brought into the field this weekend and it was possibility his shaking move in experts eyes since none of his former players were behaving like stars in last few games and Frenchman’s move to play Theo Walcott in the middle looked to be a risky bet again but result changed the outlook of Emirate side when they roamed inside the field after a must win affords. Talking about the game and how important this win was for them to revive their hopes in European league, 65-year-old said, “We had an absolute necessity to win the game and we did it in an intense and disciplined way. It was a top-level game between two top-level teams. Bayern had more possession than us but we decided to make it tight in our final third and catch them on the break.

“The last part of the game where we went longer and used long balls we could play more in their half and they struggled. I think they dropped a bit physically as well but overall I think we have beaten a very strong team and kept a good level focus from the first to the last minute and kept a clean sheet as well.”

“I don’t know,” he added replying over their standing in the group. “We need a result at Bayern. Now let’s focus on Everton.”

Klopp pleased with Reds show in his debut English game

Liverpool could be one of the struggling league sides this season and its new boss Jurgen Klopp is also feeling the pressure of being at the top of highly demotivated side hence he is not exaggeratedly reacting after his first game mentoring the Anfield side. Reds could not break its jinx in the Tottenham as well and game ended with 0-0 score on the board, however, the good thing about the game is Liverpool players performed quite confidently throughout the match and they did never look like someone passing through drought of victories this English topflight. Divock Origi, who was substituted in place of injured Daniel Sturridge, was the first one to explore a goal hitting opportunity in the first ten minutes itself but Tottenham defense was firmed enough to neutralize the shot and thereafter it was just a matter of edging psychologically over each other and no one could triumph that mind game. Talking about the game and how his side performed in the debut English game, 48-year-old German said in an interview, “It was an open game, we had our chances, they had theirs which were obviously better, but if we can play better football we will be stronger next time.

“We were a little but nervous when we had the ball and the pace was frantic. We need to improve but after three days I’m happy, I’m completely satisfied with a 0-0 draw. It was a good first step and I can work with the performance. The first 20 minutes of the game I didn’t have much influence on the game because the crowd were loud and the players started well. But when the players needed some encouragement I was there, but I was not unhappy. A draw is not by dream result, but it is okay.”

The new Anfield boss is taking the first game as the learning platform for himself where he could study crucial things to succeed in the league soccer which is undoubtedly the toughest to survive in. Generally, Germans bosses are not famous to have been successful on English duty and Klopp wants to break this theory by achieving an impressing success in his first English season, he added, “It was a very important game, because we can now work with this and show the players what was good and what was not so good and we can take the next step.”

Van Gaal defends Rooney’s drought of goals

When a skipper, who is supposed to lead from the front, fails to deliver, it becomes the responsibility of manager to keep him motivated with positive statements about his skills and how influential he has still been despite having been not so lucky in the field. Manchester United’s highly talented skipper Wayne Rooney is one such player who is missing his touch this season with just one goal to his name until now out of thirteen played games yet manager Louis van Gaal is counting over him for an impressive comeback on the top of board, in fact, Dutchman believes Rooney is still the biggest source of inspiration for other players to deliver their one hundred percent. Sidelining every rumor of having been rust in their relations, Gaal praises his skipper and says, “He’s our captain so that’s very important because his influence is bigger than every other player in our group. He’s a very important player for me, his colleagues, everybody.”

Experts are blaming this drought of goals to the new field spread of the English captain and Van Gaal is solemnly responsible for that change since 29-year-old has never been used to play back but former Real Madrid boss has a strong reason to believe Rooney can be more productive if he plays in the back. Talking about his new role, Gaal added, “He’s a second striker. Our No. 10 is a second striker. That’s what my preference is but sometimes I need another type in midfield. We’ll have to see if he continues with that because Wayne can play in different positions. He’s scored for us in the Champions League. So for me it is not so important who is scoring. We have scored a lot of goals. In the beginning your criticism was we don’t score goals, but now we’ve scored a lot of goals and you’re picking up an individual player and I don’t like that.

“I’m a manager who analyses opponents and give him advice as to how we can disorganise Everton’s defence and then maybe he can score. That is what I’m doing, not only for Wayne but all the players, especially from the view of the team tactics rather than the individual tactics.”

Nonetheless, United fans still rely over their manager’s statement and they are also not ready to accept captaincy has anything to do with Rooney form, Gaal reacted over this, “I think that is true (Captaincy burden). That is true but I don’t believe it with (Rooney), with his personality.”