Wayne Rooney's Goal Can All But Win EPL Title Race For Manchester United

Throughout the 2010-2011 season, Wayne Rooney has had a season that has experienced many different turns.

At the beginning of the season, Rooney looked to regain form after a terrible World Cup for England before deciding that he wanted to leave Manchester United and contend for a title. However, Rooney was convinced to stay at Old Trafford and earned a massive new paycheck in the process.

However, Rooney had very little effect on the Red Devils with Dimitar Berbatov and Javier Hernandez picking up the scoring load.

With the start of a new year, Rooney has started to get back on the score sheet and look like his old self against West Bromwich and Aston Villa with goals in each match.

But if there has ever been a match for Rooney to step out, the Manchester Derby would certainly be the perfect stage to announce that Rooney was back.

Last year, Rooney scored one of his most important goals against Man City in the the second leg of the Carling Cup semifinal at Old Trafford in the dying seconds of the match.

Throughout the match, Rooney was putting a solid performance together that did feature a nice headed goal-line clearance early in the second half.

But with 12 minutes to go, Rooney had his chance for stardom and did not disappoint.

With United going forward in attack, Rooney had the football at midfield but found himself unable to control it.

However, Paul Scholes was able to maintain possession for United and passed ahead to Nani on the right flank who then sent in a cross towards the penalty area.

Seeing that Nani's cross redirected off of Pablo Zabaleta, Rooney had a split second to decide that the only option he had to score was on an overhead kick.

Regardless of Micah Richards and Vincent Kompany covering him inside of the penalty area, Rooney was able to stun the capacity crowd at Old Trafford with an overhead kick goal and give Manchester United a 2-1 lead.

Following Rooney's goal, the final result of the match was never in question and Manchester United picked up their 12th win at home in 13 Premier League matches.

After the game, even Man City manager Roberto Mancini admitted the brilliance of the goal, Mancini telling reporters in his post-match press conference: “When a fantastic player like [Wayne] Rooney scores a goal like that, you should clap.”

But more importantly for the Red Devils, this goal could truly mean the beginning of the end for any other club winning the Premier League this year.

With the loss, third place City are now eight points behind United and have played one more match than their arch rival.

Right now, Arsenal appear to be the only club that are capable of catching Manchester United, but the odds of Arsenal winning the league, being four points behind Man United, are not in the Gunners favor.

The title race will now be decided on April 30 at the Emirates when Arsenal and Manchester United meet in what will be the most important match between the two sides since 2004. For Arsenal, anything but a win will probably give United the title.

But regardless of what happens in the title race this season, Wayne Rooney's goal was truly a goal for the ages and could be the most important goal that the Englishman will ever score.