Fergie hails Rooney as back to his best

Sir Alex Ferguson believes Wayne Rooney is back to his clinical best after the Manchester United striker ended the worst goal drought of his professional career in the 3-0 victory over West Ham.

Rooney netted a first half penalty on Saturday to secure his first goal in 1,113 minutes, a streak of futility for club and country that dated back to late March.

Further goals from Nani and Dimitar Berbatov rounded off a routine win for Ferguson’s team.

The United manager has no doubt that Rooney’s return to goalscoring spells good news, both for United and England who start their Euro 2012 qualifying campaign with a group game against Bulgaria on Friday and whose manager Fabio Capello was a spectator at Old Trafford.

“Of course it does,” said Ferguson when asked if the goal will relieve pressure on his forward. “But his performance for me was the thing that stood out.

“He enjoyed his football, he was full of energy, which is good. He has not had a lot of football, he had a virus last week and has not trained much this week but he looked more like himself.

“I have said time and time again, strikers need to score and now he has got off the mark. He took his penalty well but he worked his socks off. He needed games and that 90 minutes will bring him along.

“He now has a couple of games with England, and that will help him too. This international break has come at a good time for us. There are big games coming up but, nonetheless, he’ll relish those games.”

Rooney was outshone by the display of winger Nani, who scored the second goal and had a hand in the third, although his manager acknowledged that the form of the Portuguese winger presents a problem with both he and Antonio Valencia preferring the same flank.

“There has been an improvement from last year to this year and he is doing great,” said Ferguson of Nani.

“I think he prefers the right-hand side and that gives us a problem. Antonio Valencia’s performances there have been fantastic. Nani had an operation in the summer and the last two games he has been short but not today.”

Meanwhile, as United enter the international break seemingly poised for another championship bid, Ferguson could not fail but be surprised by at least one result on Saturday.

“Tottenham’s result (losing) was a surprise,” he said. “Nobody expected that, it was a great result for Wigan. It is too early to say what form the league is taking but the usual suspects are up there.”

West Ham manager Avram Grant was disappointed with the penalty decision that set United on their way but conceded that the season is proving as difficult as he feared.

“I would have to see it again but I am not sure it was a penalty,” said Grant. “We just played against a better team.

“We knew we had tough fixtures, with the exception of Bolton at home, and we knew it would be a difficult start to the season for us.

“What’s important for us is we now have a two-week break then we can start picking up points. We are only at the start of the season.

“We know it will be a tough season but our target is not only for the beginning of the season.

“We are very disappointed we don’t have any points but we have a lot of important games ahead of us and this is football. Win two games and you can be middle of the table. I believe we can do it.”

Grant also confirmed that he will continue to attempt to bring in new players up until the closing of the August transfer window on Tuesday.

“We are trying to do it,” said Grant. “We can’t spend a lot of money but we are trying to bring in players who want to develop themselves and develop the team.”