Wayne Mark Rooney (born 24 October 1985 in Croxteth, Liverpool, Merseyside) is an English footballer who currently plays for English Premier League club Manchester United and the England national team.

Rooney is the first child of Thomas Wayne and Jeanette Marie Rooney (née Morrey). He was raised in Croxteth with younger brothers Graeme and John, and all three attended De La Salle School. Wayne grew up supporting local club Everton F.C., and his childhood hero was Duncan Ferguson.


Club career

Everton F.C.

After excelling for Liverpool Schoolboys and Dynamo Brownwings, Everton signed Rooney on schoolboy terms at the age of ten.[5] He was part of the youth squad, and after scoring in an FA Youth Cup match, he revealed a T-shirt under his jersey that read, "Once a Blue, always a Blue."[6] Since he was underage at the time and therefore ineligible for a professional contract, he was playing for £80 a week and living with his family on one of the country's council estates.

On 19 October 2002, five days before his seventeenth birthday, Rooney scored a match-winning goal against reigning league champions Arsenal F.C.; in addition to ending Arsenal's thirty-match unbeaten run,[7] it made Rooney the youngest goalscorer in Premier League history, a record that has since been surpassed twice by James Milner and currently James Vaughan. He was named BBC Sports' 2002-03 Young Personality of the Year.

At the end of the 2003-04 season, Rooney, citing Everton's inability to challenge for European competition, requested a transfer that Everton refused to oblige if the transfer fee was less than £50 million. A three-year, £12,000-a-week contract offer from the club was snubbed by Rooney's agent in August 2004, leaving Manchester United and Newcastle United F.C. to compete for his signature. The Times reported that Newcastle were close to signing Rooney for £18.5 million, as confirmed by Rooney's agent, but Manchester United ultimately won the bidding war and Rooney signed at the end of the month after a £31 million deal with Everton was reached. It marked the most expensive transfer for a teenaged player, as Rooney was several weeks shy of his nineteenth birthday at the time of the signing.

On 1 September 2006, Everton manager David Moyes sued Rooney for libel after the tabloid newspaper The Daily Mail published excerpts from Rooney's 2006 autobiography that accused the coach of leaking Rooney's reasons for leaving the club to the press.[ The case was settled out of court for £500,000 on 3 June 2008, and Rooney apologized to Moyes for "false claims" he had made in the book regarding the matter.

Manchester United

Rooney made his United debut on 28 September 2004 in a 6-2 Champions League group stage win over Fenerbahçe S.K., scoring a hat-trick along with an assist. One year later, he was sent off for dissent in a goalless Champions League group draw with Villarreal CF in Spain on 14 September 2005, after he sarcastically applauded referee Kim Milton Nielsen when he was booked for a foul. His first trophy with United came in the 2006 League Cup, and he was also named man of the match after scoring twice in United's 4-0 win over Wigan Athletic in the final.

Rooney was sent off in an Amsterdam Tournament match against F.C. Porto on 4 August 2006 after hitting Porto defender Pepe with an elbow. He was punished with a three-match ban by the FA, following their receipt of a 23-page report from referee Ruud Bossen that explained his decision. Rooney wrote a letter of protest to the FA, citing the lack of punishment handed down to other players who were sent off in friendlies. He also threatened to withdraw the FA's permission to use his image rights if they did not revoke the ban, but the FA had no power to make such a decision.

During the first half of the 2006-07 season, Rooney ended a ten-game scoreless streak with a hat-trick against Bolton Wanderers F.C. and he signed a two-year contract extension the next month that tied him to United until 2012. By the end of April, a combination of two goals in an 8-3 aggregate quarterfinal win over A.S. Roma and two more in a 3-2 semifinal first leg victory over A.C. Milan[18] brought Rooney's total goal amount to twenty-three in all competitions and tied him with teammate Cristiano Ronaldo for the team goalscoring lead.

United announced during the postseason that Rooney had taken over the #10 jersey that was vacated by Ruud van Nistelrooy, who had left for Real Madrid a year earlier. He was presented with the shirt at a press conference on 28 June 2007 by former United striker Denis Law, who had also worn the number during his tenure with the club.