Manchester United can win the Premier League - Rooney

The Red Devils captain believes that an eight-point gap between his side and Chelsea is not insurmountable and hails David de Gea as "the best goalkeeper in the world"

Manchester United captain Wayne Rooney believes his side are back in Premier League title contention following Sunday's 3-0 win over Liverpool

Victory over their local rivals took Louis van Gaal's side to six top-flight wins in a row and, after a slow start to the season, they now sit third, eight points adrift of leaders Chelsea.

While the gap is relatively substantial, given the Blues' dominance after 16 matches, Rooney has not given up hope of lifting the trophy for a sixth time.

"I think we have to believe that we can win the title," Rooney told the club's official website. "We are eight points behind and coming into a busy period.

"If we can win our games and the others have one bad result then there's nothing in it. We have a lot of new players but we have been here before and this is where the experience of myself, Michael Carrick and Darren Fletcher can rub off on the other players.

"We have to keep winning our games, hopefully get back to the top and then you never know. We have shown a great resilience. Some of the games haven't gone the way we would have liked but we are winning them and that is a great quality to have."

Rooney, who has scored six league goals this season, added: "We won the league two years ago and we weren't great in a lot of those games but we got the results. Sometimes you have to do that.

"I have seen Chelsea a couple of times this season when they have not played great but have nicked a win as well. We need to try to get the performances right and, if we do that, then we are confident we will win the games."

David de Gea was lauded again for his performance against Liverpool and Rooney believes that the Spaniard has become the world's best.

"He's the best keeper in the world," the forward enthused to reporters. "He's shown great form and some of his saves are incredible.

"Edwin van der Sar had the best years of his career when he was with us in his late thirties so David has a great future ahead of him. If he keeps working hard the way he is, he will have many years at the top.

"To play in goal for United at 20 is difficult, especially trying to replace Van der Sar, who was a fantastic keeper. We knew it might take time with David and it did. The first six months, probably a year, it was hard but he worked hard on his game and it shows.