WHATEVER the world at large may believe, Saturday lunchtime’s game between Everton and Manchester United is significant because of the three points at stake and nothing more.

United need the points to ensure that they don’t start to lose track of the Chelsea juggernaut at the top of the table while the Toffees need to give the season the proverbial kick-start after their initial trio of disappointing results.

Unfortunately though, the match is likely to attract attention because, should he have the energy to actually play football, it will be the first league game to involve Wayne Rooney since the latest details of his rather colourful private life were aired in the Sunday papers.

That the match is at Goodison Park, where he always receives an excitable welcome at the best of times, has been missed by no one. We can probably expect more cameras to be trained on the crowd than on the pitch then, as television producers seek out that perennial favourite in these circumstances: the pithy message scrawled on a piece of cardboard. Given the subject matter though, they might struggle to find one suitable for broadcast in this instance.