Despite a number of lacklustre performances, a distinct lack of goals and many members of the media, fans and pundits all questioning his form, Wayne Rooney will not be dropped by Louis Van Gaal. As the BBC have reported, the Dutchman still has a great deal of faith in the England and Manchester United captain and the under fire manager describes his striker as “an example for the whole team” and a player he continues to have “confidence in”.

Rooney has only managed two Premier League goals so far this year, he has none in the Champions League proper despite scoring a hat-trick in the qualifying round vs Club Brugge and he has one in the Capital One Cup which United are now out of thanks to the loss on penalties against Boro last week. Interestingly, Rooney does have two goals for England including one which gave him the goal-scoring record ahead of United legend Bobby Charlton and he actually looked pretty good when he turned out for his national team – much better than he has for United.

There have been numerous calls from impatient fans for the English record goal scorer to have a seat on the bench for a game or two to allow the in-form Anthony Martial to play in the central striking role instead of being stuck out on the left-wing but it seems LVG will resist these calls and will stick with Rooney as the reds face CSKA Moscow in the Champions League return match tonight. United will need to do better than the 1-1 draw they achieved in Russia a couple of weeks ago if they want to avoid a nail-biting conclusion to their hopes of reaching the knockout phase of the competition and presumably LVG thinks Rooney is the man to help United get there despite a run of clumsy performances in recent weeks. The jury remains out on the 30 year old striker and it seems LVG might yet rest him if his goal scoring drought continues long-term.