Partnership with Rooney is getting stronger, says Van Persie

By Chris Davie

Dec 9, 2013 8:57:00 PM

The Dutchman insists it is important the England international boosts his goal tally and says the duo's versatility makes them difficult for defenders to handle

Robin van Persie believes his strike partnership with Wayne Rooney at Manchester United will continue to get stronger.

The duo have scored 20 goals between them in all competitions for United this season, although David Moyes’ side find themselves 15 points behind leaders Arsenal in the Premier League.

"It's the interaction together, it's that we both want to play together," Van Persie told MUTV.

"We realise that we are better off playing together because we are stronger as a partnership.

"With a player of Wayne's calibre we can go from strength to strength and become even better than we are now.

"Lately we've been playing really well together, we've been setting up goals for each other, we are both scoring, which is what I want.

"It is important that this partnership is growing and becoming even stronger."

Van Persie also claims it is the versatility shown from both himself and Rooney which makes the partnership difficult for teams to defend against.

"We are both 'nine-and-a-halves', we can play high up front, we can drop, it is an extra quality we both have which is quite rare,” the Netherlands international said.

"If you look around you have loads of main strikers, target men, 'foxes in the boxes', and you have 'number 10s' who are dropping in more and it's very obvious.

"With us it's not obvious, we can both do that job.

"Wayne is doing it a bit more because he's playing behind me but we can both do it so we can change the game if it's needed." --------------- goal.com