Rooney on England's Corners
Wayne Rooney put himself in charge of the corners during Euro against the wishes of the then manager Roy Hodgson.
The man whom Hodgson preferred for the corners was Harry Kane and Rooney let the youngster do it versus Russia, but, he felt afterwards that the Spurs striker was not too enthusiastic about doing it in the following game.
Rooney is of the opinion that it should always have been him delivering the corner balls and not Kane because Kane was better suited to play with the delivered ball due to his wonderful aerial skills and should therefore remain inside the D only.
Rooney, however, denied that reversing the roles designated by the manager led to any kind of argument later on.
Rooney was quoted as, “Roy never gave an impression that he was upset about that. There was no argument. Everything was cool when we were back in the change room. You can do a thing or two on your own too. Not necessarily does it have to be the person designated for the duty if he is not too keen on it and I definitely thought Harry was not too keen on it.” Whilst Rooney probably went off to his hotel room to play the Guns N Roses pokie at Pokies Palace, Hodgson was left to explain the situation to the press.
Rooney also pointed out that the big reason the Three Lions went down to Iceland was that they could not remain as focussed as they had been in the initial parts of the game and started trying too hard for the leveller once they were trailed.
As stated by Rooney, there was a need to remain patient and to keep tiring Iceland after the score got 1-2. If it had been done, the leveller was only a matter of time, but, because of shifting away from the focus, he and his teammates made it difficult for themselves.