Wayne Rooney: England Boss Sam Allardyce On His Captain’s Role

Wayne Rooney is good enough to play the number 10 role for England but there may be better attacking options to support Harry Kane up front, says Stuart Pearce.

On the occasion of his 116th cap – a new national record for an outfield player, overtaking David Beckham – he was expected to play behind Kane in a 4-2-3-1.

Put worldwide experience to the side, the former West Ham United and Bolton Wanderers boss is the England manager, and he tells players where they should play and must take players out who are harming the team in general.

“Yes, he played a bit deeper than he does at United, but Wayne’s comfortable, when I talk to him, about the position”.

“It’s up to me to ask whether he’s doing well in that position, and contributing”.

Having stated beforehand that he would be happy with a point, Allardyce fielded eight of the same 11 players who took on Slovakia in that sterile goalless draw at the Euros and it was hard to tell one fixture from the other until Skrtel was dismissed and England threw everything at the hosts in the latter stages. He read it very well, we won the game and dominated the game, outplaying the opposition.

“Wayne has made a decision to play a little bit too deep and we needed to get someone a little bit closer to Kane and you saw the improvement when Alli came on”.

“As the game went on and they went down to 10 men we did create chances and sometimes you’ve got to stick it out until the last minute, and thankfully today we got the goal”. He’s been a goalscorer all his life and I want him still to score goals, but he reads a game as he reads it.

Lallana will now be hoping he can build on this performance and ensure that his second England goal does not take as long to arrive as his first one.

“I must admit, he did play a little deeper than I thought he’d play today, but I was pleased with his performance”.

Rooney started in a midfield three alongside Jordan Henderson and Eric Dier despite Allardyce saying beforehand he wanted to use his captain only as a forward.

It is unlikely to be the last we hear about Rooney’s place in the team, or his apparent influence on Allardyce’s tactics. They want you to show the way forward and be successful and it’s that much bigger when the nation’s watching you. We dominated the game and finally got what we deserved. “It was about breaking that down, but we did it in the end”.