Carlos Tevez, in truth, hasn't enjoyed the easiest of starts at Manchester United. Aside from the obvious fact that, after six games, he is still waiting for his first goal, the little Argentinian striker, more generally, has had to cope with his new club's early problems in finding some attacking rhythm.
A meagre four goals so far this season: it isn't the normal sort of script produced at the Theatre of Dreams, where swashbuckling adventure is taken as read. In its place, a less threatening brand of football — a precise passing game bereft of a focal point — has just about done the job thanks to an efficient defence, boasting three clean sheets on the trot.
Yet help is at hand. By the looks of it, Rooney's return is upon us. It should come with the Champions League trip to Sporting Lisbon on Wednesday, when we may really start to see the shape of United's attacking intentions this season.
We may also start to see whether Tevez and Rooney can, in fact, forge a well-balanced strike partnership in the face of widespread doubts about their suitability. In fairness, this has been the big question ever since the man dubbed 'Apache' first arrived at Old Trafford amid a blaze of controversy.
Most United fans, understandably, couldn't care less about the various rights and wrongs of the player's move from West Ham. They were more curious to see if two little forwards of similar build could actually gel, as Sir Alex Ferguson suggests.
Still, some answers to key questions do not seem far away. Ferguson's judgement is about to be scrutinised once more. In fairness, you can understand his confidence. His team did, after all, end up as top scorers last season as well as worthy champions. Through various combinations involving Rooney, Saha, Cristiano Ronaldo and Ryan Giggs, the task of finding the back of the net rarely presented a problem. Why should anything change with Tevez on the firm, especially with Nani and Anderson providing extra options?
United stand in a healthy league position today and they haven't even got going just yet. Ditto Tevez. It will be fascinating to see if Rooney can change that.