11:20PM BST 15 Aug 2012
On the face of it, the prospect of Wayne Rooney playing in tandem with last season’s Premier League top goalscorer and the double Footballer of the Year is mouth-watering.
Rooney and Van Persie could form as formidable a partnership as Dwight Yorke and Andy Cole, a combination crucial to United’s Treble success in 1999. Similarly, Rooney and Van Persie possess the potential to provide United with the two-man strike-force that enabled United to win the Champions League in 2008. But the potential flip side to Sir Alex Ferguson’s plan would involve Van Persie failing to dovetail with Rooney, who has rarely looked at ease alongside his previous strike partners.
Alongside Ronaldo, Rooney sacrificed his attacking instincts to help the
Portuguese forward flourish. But, having claimed centre stage at
Rooney rarely looked happy alongside Ruud van Nistelrooy and, although Rooney has shown glimpses of an understanding with Dimitar Berbatov and Javier Hernández, his best form has been as the focal point of the attack.
Who will occupy that role now? It is safe to assume that Rooney and Van Persie will be asked to play as split strikers, with one just behind the other, but their early games will provide an interesting insight into what the future holds.
And what will Van Persie’s arrival mean for Danny Welbeck? He is likely to have to battle with Hernández for the role of third-choice forward, but that pair could be as useful to Ferguson as Ole Gunnar Solskjaer and Teddy Sheringham in 1999.
When Rooney questioned United’s ambition in Oct 2010, he cannot have envisaged partnering Van Persie. The challenge for Rooney now is to make it work.
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