Wayne Rooney Ruled Out For Six Weeks

According to Sky sources the knee injury Wayne Rooney picked up against Sunderland on Saturday would keep him out for the next six weeks. The United captain was left behind when the rest of the squad travelled for Thursday's Europa League game at FC Midtjylland after scan revealed he had suffered ligament damage.

Louis van Gaal did not confirm a timeframe for Rooney's recovery at his press conference in Denmark but it is understood United will be without their top scorer until the end of March. The United boss told MUTV “He has a knee problem so we have to wait and see. He scores a lot of goals so he is very important for us. We know that but we have to cope with that”. It's difficult to say, but he's injured in the game versus Sunderland and has a knee problem. We have to wait and see how long that takes. I cannot say”.

What this means is that Rooney would miss the Premier League games against Arsenal and Manchester City, among others, and a potential FA Cup quarter-final. Rooney completed Saturday's defeat at Sunderland and Van Gaal suggested the forward's fantastic attitude might have contributed to his injury saying “That's also typical Wayne. He's a guy who wants to go until the end and if he is feeling pain, he doesn't want to go away, and certainly when you are drawing a match because he wants to win. That's a fantastic attitude but also it's bad for his body. You do not know when it happened, so that's the difficulty”.