WAYNE ROONEY has revealed the pivotal intervention of an Everton legend helped set him on the right path.
English football icon Rooney, who was once the national team’s record goalscorer and holds that record for Manchester United, was known in his younger days as a bit of a bad boy.
But during his youth, Rooney has opened up on how he could have gone down a very different path.
Speaking to BBC Sport, Rooney recalled playing for his first club, under-9s team Copplehouse Colts, before he had a major turning point at the age of 14, thanks to Everton icon Colin Harvey – who was then the club’s youth team coach.
Rooney explained: “I always remember when I was about 14 – I was doing things you shouldn’t be doing.
“Colin Harvey was the under-19s manager at the time. He saw me crossing the road with a bag of cider, which of course was wrong.
“He pulled me in and said: ‘If you keep doing this, you are going to throw everything – your talent, your ability – away.
“‘You need to focus yourself because you have the ability to go on and play for not just Everton – but England.’
“From then was when I thought, ‘I need to stop doing it’.
“I stopped going out with my mates quite a lot and purely focused on football.
“I think that conversation with Colin Harvey was definitely the turning point.”
Harvey, 80, was affectionately dubbed the “white Pele” and was part of the Toffees’ “Holy Trinity” midfield alongside Alan Ball and Howard Kendall, which helped them win the First Division in 1969/70.
In fact, Harvey himself secured the title for the club that season with a superb solo goal against West Brom.
Decades later, Rooney would inherit the “white Pele” moniker as he became one of the most recognisable faces in world football.
Rooney credits his mum and dad equally in having the biggest impact on his career.
But Rooney has also taken steps of his own to try and cast off the image some people have of him.
Wayne Rooney’s record-breaking career
WAYNE Rooney took the football world by storm when he made his debut for 2002 with Everton.
He quickly became the club’s youngest-ever goalscorer aged 16 years and 342 days and was named the BBC’s Young Sports Personality of the Year.
The striker joined Manchester United in 2004 and spent 13 years at Old Trafford. He went on to make 559 appearances for the Red Devils and scored 253 goals. To this day he is still the club’s all-time leading goalscorer.
Following his spell with United, Rooney returned to Everton for a season. He also spent one-season stints with D.C. United and Derby County at the end of his career.
As well as his impressive club career, Rooney is also England’s second-highest goalscorer with 53 goals in 120 appearances, behind only Harry Kane.
After hanging up his boots, the England icon turned to a career in management.
He took charge of Derby County in 2020 and managed to just about save the club from relegation from the Championship at the end of his first season.
However, with Derby handed a 21-point deduction the following campaign, he was unable to keep them up again and subsequently left.
Then came a 15-month spell in charge of MLS side D.C. United. He failed to impress during his time in Washington and parted ways with the club at the end of the 2023 regular season.
Rooney was controversially handed the Birmingham job in October 2023, replacing John Eustace with the club doing well and sixth in the Championship table.
However, in 15 games he suffered nine defeats and managed just two wins. He was sacked in January 2024 with Birmingham down in 20th. The club were relegated to League One at the end of the campaign.
He returned to management in May with Plymouth Argyle but managed just five wins in 25 games. The United legend now finds himself out of work once again.
The 39-year-old said: “It’s no secret that I didn’t even take GCSEs but I think people assume because of that that I’m not educated, which is really wrong.
“I made a conscious effort when I was at Everton and Manchester United to educate myself in a lot of different things, such as black history and religion.
“The reason I did that was because I wanted to hold conversations with my team-mates who are from different backgrounds.
“That was something I did to help me with my team-mates and help understand how they have been brought up.
“That’s probably something people don’t understand about me.”
Rooney will be appearing as a regular pundit on Match of the Day for the upcoming season.
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