A victory for greed: In the week the nation is told money's tighter than ever, shameless footballer Wayne Rooney lands a £50m pay deal
By Ben Todd and James Tozer
Last updated at 11:57 PM on 22nd October 2010
- Massive £200,000-a-week deal puts Rooney among football's super rich
- Striker apologises to fellow players and manager for 'mistake'
He was pictured smiling cheesily alongside manager Sir Alex Ferguson despite their public criticism of each other. And just to emphasise the obsession with money in the modern game, the club charged £300 a time reproduction rights for the photograph.
All is forgiven - allegedly: Sir Alex Ferguson poses with the prodigal Wayne Rooney after the striker signed a new five-year contract yesterday
Rooney, who will celebrate his 25th birthday tomorrow with a party at his £4.5million home, apologised to fans for the ugly spat with Sir Alex, but made no excuses for his £200,000-a-week salary - double his previous pay.
The agent who negotiated it, Paul Stretford, will himself receive up to £10million for a deal finalised as child benefit was axed for many families and the coalition announced that 500,000 public-sector jobs would go.
During his stand-off with United, Rooney announced that the club no longer matched his ambition and criticised the quality of his fellow players.
In a comment which stunned many fans, he also said he would be happy to sign for arch-rivals Manchester City. The striker, who has scored just one goal this season, personally said sorry to his team-mates yesterday afternoon, then went on the club’s television channel to explain his decision to fans - some of whom had surrounded his Cheshire home on Thursday night to voice their disgust that he would consider moving to City, bankrolled by an Arab sheik worth £500billion.
‘Once it all came out, it looked as though there was nowhere to go,’ he said. ‘But the manager made it quite clear the door was still open for me to sign.
‘I spoke to my agent and said, “Let’s go in and sit down and try to resolve it to get the deal done." I am really pleased we managed to sort it out.’ Ferguson said: ‘I think he knew he had to apologise and I think everything will be swept under the carpet now and carry on where we left off about a month ago, before it all started.’
But there was widespread cynicism about the peace deal. Rooney was known to have wanted to go to Real Madrid, where his former team-mate Cristiano Ronaldo earns £250,000 a week and pays much less tax.
But this was forbidden by his 24-year-old wife Coleen’s family. His mother-in-law Colette, 48, made clear that a move away from the North West was unacceptable, cutting his options to a choice between United and City.
Going nowhere: Rooney leaving Man Utd's training ground after signing the deal yesterday, while his wife Coleen leaves the couple's home as she prepares for her husband's birthday party on Sunday
Support: Team-mate Rio Ferdinand tweeted after the five-year deal keeping Rooney at Man Utd was signed
Some football insiders suggested that the mob outside his house had convinced Rooney’s camp that his personal security would be at risk if he switched clubs.
But there were also suggestions that the five-year deal was a way of Manchester United making more money by selling him next summer. He lost many friends with his willingness to criticise the club.
Influence: Mother-in-law Colette is believed to have had a big say in Rooney's decision to stay
Rooney’s decision to stay at the club ended a rollercoaster ride which began last weekend, when the first suggestions that he would quit surfaced in a story planted with a Sunday newspaper. On Tuesday - the day before Chancellor George Osborne unveiled his £80billion austerity package to the nation - Sir Alex Ferguson confirmed that the player’s career at the club appeared to be over, describing himself as ‘dumbfounded that the boy would want to go’.
The next day Rooney’s advisers issued a statement which put him at war with Sir Alex, 68. The footballer said he was ‘surprised’ at the manager’s words, and claimed he wanted to leave because the American-owned club did not have the ambition to succeed that he needed. Yesterday it became clear that money was enough to make him stay - and the footballing world expressed astonishment at the U-turn, with one veteran saying his head had been turned by cash.
Sammy McIlroy, who played for Manchester United 342 times between 1971 and 1982, said: ‘People on his side have put figures in front of him, that’s the reason he did it. ‘They’ve put words in his mouth - the statements from him were a load of rubbish.’ Alex Stepney, United’s goalkeeper when they won the European Cup in 1968, said: ‘Loyalty has gone out of the game, unfortunately.
‘Ever since agents have been on the scene, they’ve wanted to move players on, but I would think Rooney probably feels he’s been given wrong advice this week.’ MPs said the sheer scale of Rooney’s pay deal exposed how cash was distorting the game. Ironically it came on a day that Championship club Portsmouth FC’s administrators said they would close down the 112-year-old club.
John Whittingdale - Conservative chairman of the Culture, Media and Sport select committee - expressed concern at the salaries top Premier League clubs were paying players. ‘There is this gap between what the top four or five clubs are able to pay and the rest of the Premier League - and how it affects the league,’ said Mr Whittingdale. ‘Those other clubs are left way behind.
