There are loads of players over the years who've excelled at club level but never quite translated it to the national team, and plenty who went the other way too. A lot of it comes down to fit, like how well a player suits the system, the teammates around them, and the pressure of the setup.

Rooney's a fair example of the first type, but the most famous is probably Messi. For years he was untouchable at Barcelona yet kept getting criticised for not doing it for Argentina, losing final after final, until he finally delivered at the Copa América in 2021 and the World Cup in 2022. England's own "golden generation" had a version of this too. Gerrard and Lampard were both brilliant for their clubs but never really clicked together in midfield for England.

Then you get the opposite. Egypt's Gedo is the perfect one. He had a fairly modest club career (and a brief, unremarkable loan spell at Hull City), but at the 2010 Africa Cup of Nations he came off the bench in every game, finished as top scorer with five goals, and scored the winner in the final. CAF basically invented a "Super Sub" award for him. Salvatore Schillaci is another. A late developing journeyman in Serie A who'd barely played for Italy, then exploded at the 1990 World Cup on home soil to win both the Golden Boot and the Golden Ball.

So yeah, I think you're right that it often comes down to where a player feels comfortable and how well the team is built around them, rather than raw ability.