Roy Hodgson will not be writing Wayne Rooney out of England’s World Cup plans even if the striker’s Manchester United future remains unresolved heading into next month’s vital qualifiers.
Rooney has reported for duty ahead of tomorrow’s friendly with Scotland despite not featuring in any of United’s competitive pre-season games due to hamstring and shoulder problems.
Red Devils boss David Moyes was at pains to stress there were no issues between him and the £27 million forward following Sunday’s Community Shield match.
Yet, after turning down two bids from Chelsea for the player and insisting they will not sell, United do seem to have set themselves against Rooney, who is adamant he wants to leave.
For all Moyes’ explanations, there did not appear to be too much wrong with Rooney when he emerged for training at St George’s Park, half an hour ahead of schedule.
While the position is inconvenient for Hodgson prior to this week’s game, it would be far more serious if England were getting themselves ready for next month’s matches against Moldova and Ukraine with Rooney in an equally poor state of preparation given the importance of those two fixtures.
Yet, such is the 27-year-old’s importance to the national cause, there is simply no way Hodgson can merely brush him aside on the basis of a lack of match practice.
“It would be very nice if that happened, both for him and his club,” said Hodgson, when asked whether he would prefer Rooney’s situation to be resolved quickly.
“My hope and desire is that is what will happen.
“But in my year and a bit as national team manager, I have been faced many times with a situation where players are not always playing in their team but because they have the qualities, talent and skills we are looking for, they have managed to be selected.
“I am hoping that won’t be the case with Wayne but I am not prepared to make any statements to suggest if he is not playing he cannot be considered for England.
“He will always be considered for England whilst he is physically fit because he is one of our best players.”
Although he was obviously speaking tongue-in-cheek, Hodgson raised an eyebrow as he explained Rooney’s early appearance for training.
He said: “He knows you guys are there probably. He hasn’t had enough of the mass media recently and wanted to get his face on TV.”
Nevertheless, Rooney did seem to be making a point.
Manchester United manager Moyes said on Sunday that Rooney had trained with the club’s reserves last week because he needed some non-contact work to protect the sore shoulder deemed serious enough to rule him out of a trip to Sweden and Rio Ferdinand’s testimonial, in addition to Sunday’s 2-0 win over Wigan.
Yet Hodgson confirmed Rooney had been able to do “everything”, a situation he does not expect to change prior to training today, even though he will take the precaution of analysing the player’s performance data first.
“Wayne looked good, which was just what I expected really,” said Hodgson.
“It is difficult to assess with the naked eye how match fit people are, but there is no doubt in my mind, from that session, that he is not suffering any physical injury.”
Meanwhile, Hodgson hopes this will be the season where Jack Wilshere finally consigns his injury troubles to history.
With much of the attention surrounding England’s get-together yesterday focused on Rooney, Wilshere’s presence slipped by without much notice.
But the midfielder’s return is big news for England and Hodgson knows it. A string of serious injuries have meant Wilshere has only started one game for the Three Lions since 2011.
That one performance a man-of-the- match display against Brazil was enough to whet Hodgson’s desire to see more, though, and he now hopes he will be able to count on the 21-year-old for the rest of England’s World Cup qualifying campaign.
“I am really pleased he is back with us because he is a precocious talent,” the England manager said.
“His game against Brazil, where he got the man of the match award, still lives long in the memory.
Arsenal are so aware of Wilshere’s injury history that the player has not completed a full 90 minutes in pre-season, despite playing five of the club’s seven games.
It is something that Hodgson is also conscious of, meaning the player is likely to only a limited part in the friendly against Scotland.