Unsettled forward Wayne Rooney can look at life from both sides now

WELL, at least Wayne Rooney got something out of an otherwise disappointing night.

WELL, at least Wayne Rooney got something out of an otherwise disappointing night.

Picked by David Moyes, his name sung to the rafters - and by both sets of supporters at Old Trafford - these were not 90 desultory minutes for the England forward after his summer of discontent.

Whether that is a good thing, of course, is debatable. It is hardly a surprise that footballers think they can act as they please when we listened to Rooney being so lauded last night (Monday). Talent means that you are forgiven for just about anything, especially in football, so Rooney returned to Manchester United not as a mutineer but as a prodigal son.

If there was easy mischief for Chelsea supporters in chanting for Rooney - "We'll see you next week," they sang - there was probably a little desperation among the massed United choir. Many have spent the summer wanting rid of a troublemaker. Now that they see a thin squad without reinforcements, they are back worshipping the ground he treads on.

"He's a Manchester United player and he'll prove it tonight (Tuesday)," David Moyes had said. And Rooney did in a ceaseless performance that was as much as his manager could have asked for, and more than any other forward contributed on such a deflating night.

Rooney went about demonstrating that he cares - or at least is going to make a very good pretence of it - and he did that first in the way an Englishman knows best, by clumping an opponent.

Only a few minutes had elapsed when he threw an elbow at the back of John Terry's head. The Stretford End swooned.

The biggest cheer of the night might just have been when Rooney scurried back to his own goalline to dispossess Ramires, battling on the ground until he stole the ball away. "Rooney, Rooney," rang around the stadium, puncturing the yawning silence.

Rooney's eagerness to prove his professionalism expressed itself in far more positive ways as he spread play to the flanks, and probed away at Chelsea.

For Rooney's performance alone, Moyes could be relieved. Sir Alex Ferguson had left him with "the Rooney problem" with his vengeful swipe on the way out of Old Trafford, but Moyes's authority has thus far been reinforced by how he has handled that ticking bomb.

It has not been an easy issue for Moyes, handling the media spin against him from the Rooney camp and repeated wind-ups from Mourinho right up to the morning of this game.

He could claim one small victory out of his 0-0 draw in Rooney's performance, though we wait to hear the striker declare that he accepts that his future lies at Old Trafford.

Perhaps we will be waiting for the end of the transfer window, which is less than a week away, but United's consistent claims that the player would have to accept their stance that he will not be sold to Chelsea at any price looked vindicated today.

It was one tangible thing to take from an anticlimax of a game that had seemed to offer so much. We all tingled with expectation for the first big duel of this Donald Rumsfeld season - so many unknown unknowns - so imagine how Moyes must have felt on such a proud occasion.

He has worked and scrapped for his professional life at Preston North End and led out Everton for an FA Cup Final. But at United he faces responsibility on a scale that he was bound to find daunting in his early weeks as United manager. Mobbed in Asia, he carries the hopes of fans across the planet.

It is not just the big things but the little things that are challenges to him. We saw him required to confront the difficulty for the very first time of conveying a message from his technical area and cutting through the Old Trafford din.

"I know I have to go out there and show you fans, and everyone at Manchester United that I'm the right successor," he had written in the program notes.

In return, they offered some encouragement with a new banner draped at the Stretford End proclaiming their new Glaswegian leader as "the Chosen One".

Moyes could claim to have come out the better of his first tactical match-up with Mourinho.

The obvious fear that United would be outnumbered in midfield, especially when Chelsea's strikerless line-up was announced, did not come to pass (sadly, very few players had come to pass).

United dominated, and it was hard to recall a Mourinho team seem so uncertain of their purpose. If this was supposed to be a Barca-lite swarm of attackers, it failed to cause a buzz. If it was supposed to be a message to his club - "I need a striker" - it could be counted as more successful.

Either way, until a late flurry through Fernando Torres, Chelsea showed only that Mourinho is a way from perfecting his line-up.

United had the better chances but they could not find the crucial finish, though Rooney was still trying to the end with an attempted bicycle kick.

It did not come off but United fans had already embraced Rooney, so glad to have him back. Is he glad to stay? Perhaps it does not matter as long as he keeps trying hard.

The Times