Wayne Rooney-led England win, lose support

England's Wayne Rooney celebrates after scoring the opening goal during the international friendly soccer match between England and Norway (Source: AP)

SUMMARY

For the first time in the history of the new Wembley, the arena was less than half full for an England international.

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The promise of the start of a brave new England was hardly given much impetus at an underpopulated Wembley despite Wayne Rooney beginning his captaincy with the winning penalty in a 1-0 victory over Norway on Wednesday.

For the first time in the seven-year history of the new Wembley, the arena was less than half full for an England international as 40,181 underwhelmed fans witnessed a familiar old diet of mostly turgid, uninspiring fare from Roy Hodgson’s World Cup failures, enlivened mainly by the sparky contribution of Raheem Sterling.

It was the Liverpool teenager’s constant buzzing and probing at the fringes of the Norwegian defence which finally undid the visitors after 68 fairly laborious minutes as he outfoxed and outpaced Omar Elabdellaoui, forcing the Olympiakos man into a rash challenge on the left edge of the box.

Relief seemed to shoot through Rooney, who had hitherto looked to be trying almost too hard in his newly-offered captaincy role, as he stepped up to smash the resultant penalty with some venom high past Orjan Haskjold Nyland for his 41st England goal.

Until then, his England, with its inexperienced pallor, a midfield yet to gel and still seemingly suffering from a post-Brazil hangover, could only huff and puff as they tried to blow away the world’s 53rd ranked team. Norway’s dogged starting line-up was typified by featuring just two players from the second tier of the English game.

For much of the time, it was painful to behold England, a reflection of some of the team’s hapless and winless struggles in Brazil in the first game since those indignities.

Rooney could, as usual, not be faulted for effort but this was not one of his inspirational nights and, indeed, England looked sharper once he was substituted after his goal and Arsenal’s new signing Danny Welbeck provided a lively cameo.