Wayne Rooney

Okay, the England international has just returned from injury and was bound to be a bit rusty, and he had not played with Juan Mata and Robin van Persie previously as an attacking three, but he will still be disappointed with his individual performance.

Rooney, to his credit, covered a massive amount of grass as he looked to begin his comeback with a bang, but it led to him being bypassed in certain situations.

He managed four shots, one from just inside the Stoke half which hit the target, but should've done better with a close range strike from deep inside the Stoke box.

He went up for seven headers and lost them all and was wasteful in his distribution. He played one creative pass that split the City team, but other than that he looked sloppy.

There's no doubting that he is a match winner, or at least when he wants to be, and he will use it as a platform to improve, but I don't think he should be starting the next one.

Especially as the United squad is packed with so much talent.

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Comments

[BENARD]

I think Rooney played well.The man to be totally dropped is Michael Carick.I imagine in a space of three games he scores two goals into his own net in the name of deflection.

Also note Chis Smalling's negative contributions in this seasons.He commits very silly fouls which turns to set pieces and at the end disappointing goals.

[gladiator11]

I do not think Manchester United deserve to win against Stoke as they have not created any real chance in the box.Moyes only rues misfortune but when you look at he match it is not the Man u we knew before which crashed Arsenal 8-2.Only Mata and Van Persie played well, the other players are like MUPPET particularly Cleverley,Smalling and even Rooney. But we must be with Moyes until the end.Viva Man utd

[Jose]

I was sincerely saddened when I saw Ashley in the team even when we played Cardiff, but he scored a goal and had tot take a bit of stick from my friends. but I insist, he should be sold, he s not a man utd player. I am willing to give moyes time, but if for him young should play each week, then moyes clearly isn't the man to manage u united. He so sloppy, attacking and defending, we ve got januzaj and Valencia..
Another disastrous point for moyes is having in your squad the best attacking midfielder there was in the bundesliga and in the Chelsea squad, kagawa and mata and he ll use them on the flank.
He s been talking that united don't do emergency buys in january, but hello moyesy, we really needed emergency buys. Mata was our only buy, which, in that position, we have about 10players who can play that game. Surely carrick is past his best while cleverley is not showing up to be a united player, we sold andow and fletcher is still recovering so a central midfielder, emergency or not, had to be bought.
It goes the same at the back, rio and visa are always injured, while Evans (which I really like) seems always having trouble with his calf. Obviously we can't rely on smalling.
Emergency or not we should've had more buys and moyes must stop always saying we played well. No we didn't, we wer rounded by stoke. For me, as rude as it may be, if he didn't push for new faces in January and we don't reach top 4, then he should be sacked.

[Stuart]

The fact he played Young over Januzai or Valencia and stuck Cleverley in again just shows he doesn't have a clue.Mark my words we will not win a thing under this man.Please sack him along with those 2 garden gnomes he calls assistants.I know when a manager is a winner or an also-ran i think you know which one this guy is.