The scoreline may have flattered United slightly, but Wayne Rooney's performance most certainly did not flatter to deceive. The England forward's remarkable renaissance continued as he took his scoring tally to eight goals in the past six games for club and country.
Statistics, however, do not do justice to Rooney's current dominance of his profession and any opponent unfortunate enough to come across his path. Rooney started the eventual rout at Old Trafford, but also had a perfectly valid first-half effort ruled out for a phantom push on Gianni Zuiverloon and assisted on goals for Cristiano Ronaldo and Nani, with strike partner Dimitar Berbatov scoring the other. Add his recent displays for England, and the fact that Rooney does not turn 23 until Friday, and the young Scouser may currently be the most irresistible force in European football.
'He's 23 and you expect players to improve,' said Sir Alex Ferguson, adding a couple of days to his player's age. 'It's a natural process, like when Ronaldo was younger. 'The boy has that incredible individual talent and as players get older, they learn to make the right decisions more and time their game better, as they get more experience. I think we will see players like him improve at this club all the time.'
Ferguson has pointed out repeatedly that scoring 'in spurts' is currently Rooney's modus operandi and, short term at least, United's next few opponents can only hope his current strike rate of better than a goal a game cools.
The prospect of a more consistent Rooney may be frightening to United's rivals, but it is one Ferguson believes is inevitable. 'Wayne tends to go in spurts and that's probably a sign of his immaturity,' said Ferguson. 'When he gets older, his goalscoring will spread out better - that's a natural thing that will happen. But, at the moment, when he is on one of these spurts, he is fantastic.'
Even Rooney himself, a cautious interviewee at the best of times, was forced to admit he is 'maybe' playing the best football of his life and Albion can count themselves fortunate that they will not have to face opponents of his quality every weekend in this campaign.
Yet, strangely, there had been little hint in the first half of the deluge to come. Despite Rooney's disallowed 'goal', Albion had defended superbly and, but for a couple of late first-half corners from Rooney, rarely looked troubled.
But nor did they look likely to score, or even interested in scoring. And after the restart, United maintained their ferocious tempo and finally wore down the visitors.
Scott Carson had kept out shots from Rooney and Berbatov before, in the 56th minute, the Bulgarian sprung Rooney with a pass from the halfway line and the forward powered into Albion territory, easily sidestepping Ryan Donk before beating the keeper with an unstoppable near-post shot.
In the 69th minute, any lingering hope Albion had of rescuing a point from their visit disappeared when Ronaldo doubled the home team's lead. Darren Fletcher's short pass was helped into the path of Ronaldo by Rooney and the Portuguese winger easily slotted the ball past the advancing Carson.
Two minutes later, Berbatov netted a goal his overall quiet performance had scarcely merited, nonchalantly turning in the ball at the far post after Jonas Olsson had failed to deal with Nani's low cross. Nani himself completed the rout on the stroke of normal time, turning in Rooney's far-post cross after Ryan Giggs and Berbatov had launched another flowing attack.
'We defended naively in the second half,' said Albion manager Tony Mowbray. 'But what matters to us is what happens against Hull City next week. If we beat them, like we beat West Ham and Fulham, we will be all right. It's not what matters against teams like United that matters to us.'
THE FANS' PLAYER RATINGS AND VERDICT
Ray Hunt, Observer reader
Super result, but we took our time getting there. They played well first half and started better than us, though we had a disallowed goal. We began the second half with real purpose, as if they'd received a pointed reminder from the boss. What struck me is the sheer pace we play at, the play is so slick. Rooney in this kind of form is just great for English football. Berbatov is a United player all over – he's never going to hare around, but he'll be key for us. The scoreline was harsh on them, given how well they played first half, but it was important we got the points and stayed in touch with Chelsea and Liverpool. Rooney's finishing last season was truly awful, but nowadays he looks like he's favourite to win one-on-one goal-scoring chances.
The fan's player ratings Van der Sar 6; Da Silva 5 (Neville 6), Ferdinand 7, Vidic 7, Evra 6 (O'Shea 6); Ronaldo 8, Fletcher 7, Giggs 7, Park 6 (Nani 7); Rooney 9, Berbatov 5
Terry Wills, Baggies@yahoogroups.com Our main objective was to show we could compete. After Rooney's goal our heads dropped. They dominated and we struggled to stay with them. We created very little, we had lots of possession but once they took the lead we were out of it. We're disappointed with the result, though, not with our performance. Our defensive strength was great in the first half. Zuiverloon stood out and was calm under pressure, he's a great player. The speed of United in breaking from defence caught us out. No one played especially badly, but we were playing against a very good side. I thought we'd lose by a couple of goals, so four was a bit harsh. I'd actually say it was a solid performance, despite the 4-0 thrashing! You've got to play well to get anything up here at Old Trafford, but we enjoyed it.
The fan's player ratings Carson 6; Zuiverloon 8, Donk 5, Olsson 5, Robinson 5; Morrison 6, Koren 6 (Moore 4), Greening 5, Brunt 5; Valero 6, Bednar 5 (Miller 6)
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