Wayne Rooney blasts Harry Kane’s ‘incredible’ post-match interview claims on Bayern Munich and PSG’s nine-goal Champions League thriller
Wayne Rooney has criticized Harry Kane’s assessment of Bayern Munich’s performance after he saluted his defenders in the thrilling 5-4 first leg thrashing of Paris Saint-Germain.
Bayern lost by one goal in a chaotic nine-goal epic at the Parc des Princes on a night where the quality of both teams’ forwards was appreciated.
However, Kane, who started the scoring with a penalty in the first half, preferred to focus on his side’s defense in his post-match Amazon Prime interview.
“Even though nine goals were scored, there was incredible defending in the 1v1s,” said Kane.
‘You have the best players in the world. The best attackers, the best defenders. Of course, sometimes attackers will also step up and show their quality.
Harry Kane and Bayern Munich players who lost 5-4 to PSG on Tuesday night
Rooney, who works as a pundit, was unimpressed by Kane’s claims in post-match interview
‘When you look back at the centre-half players who played in midfield, sometimes in attack, playing against wingers, thank them. This is a really difficult job. ‘I thought they were extraordinary.’
However, Rooney thought his former England teammate’s comments were ridiculous.
“Listen, I love Harry Kane,” Rooney said. ‘But there’s no way he can praise his defenders.’
Vincent Kompany’s men featured a backline of Jonathan Tah, striker Dayot Upamecano, Alphonso Davies and Josip Stanisic, ahead of Manuel Neuer.
“Maybe he’s trying to give them some confidence for next week because they are team-mates,” Rooney added.
‘I think both teams’ defense was really bad tonight, so I think he was being a bit modest there.’
Meanwhile, Thierry Henry said that viewers should not care if the defense was bad or not.
Speaking to CBS, he said: ‘We’ve been saying lately that we’re seeing teams that don’t take risks, players that don’t dribble, teams that play not to lose rather than to win. There was a lot of risk taking tonight.
Kane impressed with defensive quality in PSG 5-4 Bayern
So if you’re wearing your pro-defense hat, yeah, you might go crazy watching tonight’s game… But I don’t care.
‘We’ve been complaining for a year or two that football is boring, but this match wasn’t! Leaving the professional part of the job at home, I had a lot of fun, and I think everyone at home had fun too. It was just crazy.’
While French daily sports newspaper L’Equipe hailed ‘Football Total’ on its front page on Wednesday morning, the sports editor of BILD in Germany wrote: ‘Never before has there been such astonishment and shaking of heads in disbelief.’
It was another night of personal success for Kane, who broke Steven Gerrard’s record by scoring in six consecutive Champions League matches.
He also played a key role in Bayern’s thrilling comeback from three goals down in the second half.
The second leg in Munich will be played next Tuesday, with Bayern and PSG set to face the winner of the match between Atletico Madrid and Arsenal. The first leg of the tie will be played at the Metropolitano in Madrid this evening.
