WAYNE ROONEY: I WENT TO LIVERPOOL IN AN EVERTON KIT
Wayne Rooney sat down with our partner’s Toffee TV for an exclusive interview.
Rooney became an instant hit when he broke into Everton’s team in 2002, and he went on to become Manchester United’s record goalscorer and a Premier League icon.
“I knew I was a good player, but when you’re 11 or 12, you don’t think you’ll be a professional player. They kept moving me up the age groups so I was playing with older lads, still improving,” Rooney says.
“It probably wasn’t until I was about 14, 15, when I really kicked on. Then I started thinking yeah, I’m going to play for Everton. Up until then I never thought about playing for the first team.”
But things could have been very different, as Rooney details it was Everton’s fierce rivals Liverpool who originally invited him for a trial.
Rooney, though, could not let go of his Everton roots.
He adds: “I then went for a trial with Liverpool first, did one day, went in in my Everton kit, and then someone got in touch from Everton that night and that was it, I didn’t go back to Liverpool!
“There were a few [wide eyes] when I went into Liverpool with my Everton kit, but to be honest it was the only kit I had. I didn’t really want to go! But I thought I best just go. I was a bit gutted Everton hadn’t come in, because I was doing really well, but Everton must have found out I’d gone for the trial with Liverpool in my Everton kit, they called my dad up that night, so it was straight into Everton then.
“I was buzzing, as an Evertonian to play for the academy, I just loved every minute of it.”
But how did Rooney first get into football? What was his grassroots story?
“I don’t know really, as far back as I remember. I was lucky, where I lived, we had the youth club, so the pitch was behind my house,” he adds.
“I used to just climb over the fence, I was on there on my own for hours, just playing. Got out on the streets, I just enjoyed it, loved everything about it. I used to go play with the older lads, and they’d let me join in because I was better than the kids my age. I joined a club when I was seven or eight.”