Everton Fan View: Wayne Rooney should never take a penalty again

Wayne Rooney is a very poor penalty taker, and should never be allowed to take penalties at Everton. His spot kick against Burnley was the 49th penalty that his has taken in his career. Of those 49 penalties, he has managed to miss 12 of them. That gives him a dreadful conversion rate of 76%.

Taking just the Premier League into account however, and it looks even worse for Rooney. He has had 33 penalties in the competition, missing 10 of them for a conversion of 70%, which is one of the worst in the competition’s history for player to have taken over 10 penalties.

That would be something Everton would just have to put up with if there weren’t any better penalty takers in the squad, but there simply is. Leighton Baines has only just returned to the squad and everyone knows that he is a mild-mannered gentleman who doesn’t want to cause a rift with his teammates.

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This was seen when he allowed Romelu Lukaku to take the penalties at Everton. He also has a dreadful record, missing three out of his nine in the Premier League with a conversion of 67%. This is where it is up to the manager to dictate who the penalty taker is. Baines has taken 22 of them in the Premier League and has only faltered twice, giving him a career percentage of 91%.

Baines though, hasn’t been on the pitch a lot this season, but Gylfi Sigurdsson has. He has taken 25 penalties in his career so far, and has only missed two with a conversion rate of 92%. It’s clear as day that Rooney should not be taking them. This season he has taken six and only scored half of them.

It hasn’t mattered, yet

Thankfully, they haven’t mattered. Two of those misses were luckily followed up and scored, and the other was on Saturday when we were already 2-0 up against Brighton. Soon though, it could matter, and it could make a crucial difference. Rooney needs to take his arrogance out of the situation and realise that he’s not good enough from 12 yards.

It’s up to him or the manager to make sure the best penalty taker is stood over the ball – at Everton that is clearly Baines or Sigurdsson, and definitely not Rooney. With such a poor record, it’s crazy how many he’s been allowed to take. He must still think that he’s good at them, buthe’s such a large character that others obviously don’t want to take the ball out of his hands.

A lot say that he should be captain of the club, but leadership is also about delegating responsibility and making the best choices for your team. Wayne Rooney should never be the choice from the penalty spot, and hopefully his miss against Brighton is the last time we ever see him take one.