Rooney all grown up and ready to lead England

The life and times of Wayne Rooney, England’s star and star-crossed forward, can be floridly traced in the body art of his tattoos.

On his right forearm is inked “Just Enough Education to Perform.” It is an album tribute to his favorite band, the Stereophonics, but also perhaps an unintended confirmation of his petulant, hot-headed youth.

When last seen in the World Cup four years ago, Rooney was being ejected for doing a Portuguese folk dance on the groin of defender Ricardo Carvalho in the quarterfinals. England exited in that same match against Portugal on penalty kicks.

“He had a bit of a temper; he lost his head seemingly in important situations, but it’s something he’s gotten control over,” said Jonathan Spector, a defender with the United States, which will face Rooney and England on June 12 in Rustenburg, South Africa.

“In the past, players tried to get into his head, knowing he could snap,” said Spector, who plays for West Ham United in the English Premier League. “It doesn’t seem to happen anymore.”

A sign of Rooney’s newfound maturity at 24, we are assured, is fatherhood. After an exhibition match last week, Rooney unveiled on his back a tattoo of praying hands and angels’ wings etched with the name of his 6-month-old son, Kai.

As the World Cup approaches, Rooney is widely considered the planet’s second-best soccer player behind Lionel Messi of Argentina. He enters the tournament having scored 34 goals in all competitions this past season for Manchester United, shouldering greater responsibility after Cristiano Ronaldo left for Real Madrid.

Older and wiser is how Rooney described himself at a news conference last month in London. By this he presumably meant that he is no longer encumbered by stories of his admitted visits to prostitutes as a teenager; libelous tabloid accusations (for which he won a lawsuit in 2006) that he had slapped his wife, Coleen (then his fiancée), in a nightclub; or reports of gambling losses that surpassed $1 million in one spree.

On the field, this son of a Liverpool family of amateur boxers has curbed his pugilistic instincts. And he has also apparently toned down his baroque oratorical style (he is once said to have used a certain word more than 20 times in 60 seconds during a Socratic parry with a referee).

“You are excited and emotional when you make decisions, but now I have matured on and off the pitch,” Rooney said at the news conference. “Now I probably take my anger out during training the week before the game.”

On his left arm, Rooney has another tattoo, the St. George’s Cross of England. The red cross on a white field will be flown proudly and nervously by England’s supporters during the World Cup in hopes that Rooney’s X-rays and magnetic resonance imaging scans will not become more prominent news than his tattoos.

Rooney’s knee, ankle and groin injuries in the last two months have put England in a familiar and conflicted position — hoping to win the World Cup, fearing things will end too early, as they have since a triumph on home soil in 1966.

Landon Donovan, the American midfielder, has said that Rooney seems “worn out” after a long club season. Fabio Capello has declared Rooney “100 percent” fit. Capello is England’s manager, not a doctor or a palm reader. A country expectantly and fretfully waits. Perhaps none of the World Cup contenders are as dependent on one player as England is on Rooney.

With him in good health, the Three Lions could reach the final or even win. If his body breaks down — Rooney broke a toe in the 2004 European championships and just before the 2006 World Cup — many feel that England’s chances will be equally fractured.

“The whole country would go into mourning,” said Barry Glendenning, a soccer writer for The Guardian.

Chunky and meaty-faced, Rooney was conspicuously absent from the group of sculptured international soccer stars photographed for the June issue of Vanity Fair magazine. But he relies on six-shooter legs, not six-pack abs. At his best, Rooney is an incessant worker, deceptively fast on the ball, instinctual in finding a sliver of space, solid in the air, able to shoot from anywhere and increasingly smarter about his runs into the box.

“Maturity is one of the final parts of a player’s development,” Manchester United Manager Alex Ferguson said. “You have to wait until their mid-20s before they get that authority, timing, the maturity, to do things that those qualities bring. This season, he accepted the fact that to get the best out of himself, he had to conserve his energies for the best part of the pitch — the penalty box area.”

Nine of the 23 Americans on the World Cup roster played in England this past season, so the United States will be more than familiar with Rooney. Man-marking him is too risky, several of the Americans said.

“They have too many other players who can hurt you,” Spector said. “You get dragged out of position and they’ll find the gaps.”

Instead, the Americans will have to rely on discipline and a collective, unyielding effort from a defense left uncertain by injury. They will have to challenge Rooney’s first touch and challenge themselves to work as hard as he will.

“If you know where he is at all times and you do that for 90 minutes, you should be O.K.,” said goalkeeper Brad Guzan, who plays for Aston Villa. “If you do it for 89 minutes, he’ll find a way to punish you.”

In the past, said goalkeeper Marcus Hahnemann, who plays for Wolverhampton, Rooney’s Vesuvian eruptions were regular and predictable enough to mark with an egg timer.

“The bad thing is now he’s controlling his temper,” Hahnemann said.

www.nytimes.com