Former England player believes Wayne Rooney should just retire

Peter Shilton is a retired footballer who during his playing career, he managed to make over 100 appearances for the English national football team and Shilton has recently voiced his thoughts concerning Wayne Rooney and it seems like Shilton is not a fan of seeing the Manchester United player performing at the international stage.


Wayne Rooney is 30 years old and his performances have recently been underwhelming, the Englishman has consistently been critiqued for his contributions as he just isn’t the same player that he was a few years ago.

The captain of Manchester United, Rooney does indeed have intentions of hanging up his boots and stop performing for his national side after the 2018 FIFA World Cup reaches it’s end but Peter Shilton believes that Rooney should retire sooner than that.

Former England captain, Peter Shilton said: "I don't think he's a striker any more.He is spraying a few balls around, but I don't think he's being very effective. I thought he should have retired after the Euros. It's not because he could break my record, it’s far from it. If he does and he plays well, fine."

If the England national football team did not have other offensive options then Wayne Rooney would probably not be receiving so much criticism but the problem is that there is actually a healthy amount of youngsters that could be given the chance to regularly perform in the first team of Sam Allardyce including the likes of: Marcus Rashford, Ryan Mason, Oxlade-Chamberlain, Jesse Lingard, Jonjo Shelvey, Harry Kane, Dele Alli, Raheem Sterling and the list goes on even further.

With this healthy stream of youngsters arriving for the English national side, their chances to get consistent playing time at the international stage is hampered if Rooney continues to get a spot ahead of everyone else despite his recent string of underwhelming performances and this is one of the main reasons of why not only Peter Shilton but other football figures such as: Alan Shearer have made their voice be heard as they want Rooney to just retire from the international scene.

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