Wayne Rooney’s recent indiscretions, where the striker reportedly slept with a £1200-a-night call girl, make uncomfortable reading for Manchester United fans wishing their hero to be a role model and a star player. Indeed, in this age of celebrity and moralising tabloids, Rooney’s infidelity is sure to keep him on the front pages for weeks.
The question is should supporters be concerned about the moral implications of a player’s actions any more than their performances on the pitch? After all, one of the greatest complaints from modern-day footballers is the supposed invasion of privacy by the tabloids into their lives outside of the training ground and matchdays.
It’s a question that Chelsea supporters recently faced after John Terry had an affair with the former girlfriend of Wayne Bridge in a high profile case. The Chelsea player faced weeks of media scrutiny, lost his role as England’s captain and has rarely regained form for club or country since.
Rooney’s case is neither proven – at least until the player makes an admission – nor raises the same questions as the Terry affair. But United supporters will face a similar choice; cast aside the player’s public humiliation and focus solely on ‘supporting the shirt’, or admit that overpaid footballers are not the heroes fans want them to be.
The question is perhaps even more taxing for the truth about so many of the highly paid, cosseted young men in professional football. After all Rooney’s behaviour is not vastly different from that of Anderson, Cristiano Ronaldo and Nani, who employed legions of prostitutes in the pursuit of entertainment. Nor Terry in pursuit of his ex-teammates former lover.
In an age where drugs and alcohol are beyond the pale for professional athletes, sex is the new rock and roll.
In these cases supporters frequently ignore the game of moral absolutes that the nation’s tabloids have mastered. Indeed, Chelsea supporters engaged in a Terry love-in that almost matched the vitriol they meted out for his victim, Bridge. It’s almost inconceivable that United fans will not act in much the same way by showering Rooney with support.
By contrast football fans the length of the country will enjoy today’s – multiple – tabloid exclusives, aping the red tops’ moral superiority. Rooney’s infidelity, after all, is the disgraceful epitome of high-earning footballers, who are both stupid and arrogant beyond belief. They surely deserve whatever they get?
It matters little whether the allegations in the News of the World, Sunday Mirror and then – some hours later – every media outlet on the planet are actually true. There is no evidence presented bar the prostitute, Jenny Thompson’s, testimony. In these cases, print becomes truth and vice versa.
After all Rooney has form according to the tabloids, sleeping with hookers at aged 16, including Auld Slapper the 48-year-old Liverpool grandmother. The most in-depth analysis of this period concludes this story was almost certainly not true. Today, the Daily Mail claimed Rooney had “admitted” to this peculiar case of MILF-hunting. Wish fulfilment, perhaps.
Thompson’s scripted interviews today are merely the controlled content output of an industry that desires the salacious above all, while still claiming to guide the ethical compass. The papers had little trouble following up the moralistic tone with a tits-n-ass photoshoot, allowing Thompson to titillate as well as entertain.
Let’s just assume the word irony has been routinely scrubbed from dictionary corner at red top towers.
For the foreseeable future United fans must make the same misguided choice. Is it Rooney, the love rat, cheating on his innocent pregnant wife, touched by a sense of infallibility that is born of almost unbelievable wealth? Or perhaps, by contrast, it’s the fault of the seedy, exploitative, tabloid newspapers, seeking website hits and paper sales.
Truth be damned; it’s all that’s fit to print.
Perhaps the best route is something different. Discover for a moment an epiphany. Admit now that rich and talented though they may be, our nation’s footballers are no different from the cheating, lying, hedonistic, self-obsessed young men that inhabit this very land.
That includes you tabloid newspaper editors, United fans, opposition supporters and curious bystanders.
You’ll feel better for it.
I knew it. There was talk of injunctions a while ago and seeing his touch during the world cup, it all seemed to make sense that it would be him. Apparently there is another one against Gerrard…
If it is true than I don’t know what to think, other than that I have no respect for Wayne. From now on, just do your job and shut up. He is one of the most famous people in the world, top 10 in this country and thus, has a responsibility to observe and abide by. On top of that, he has sentenced us, the fans to humiliation and months of stick from others. Especially after the Terry debacle. What that scumbag did was worse but hey, sin is sin right?
Why did Rooney not just pay her off? 400k ain’t that much to him – particularly as this will affect his £6M a year sponsorships. It’s either completely false or there’s more to come.
I’ve got a feeling there’s going to be lots more girls coming out of the woodwork in the coming weeks. Tiger Woods mk II.
Some blogs are reacting to this news like teenage boyband fans. 90% of footballers are scumbags get over it.
If I wanted to watch players with a moral compass, I would’ve had to give up watching top flight football a long time ago.
Zi, are you casting the first stone?
Firstly, this extended Biblical metaphor has gone too far.
Secondly, call it whatever you want to call it but he has a heightened responsibility. He does a TV show around kids who are susceptible to his influence. Also, he calls himself a good Christian and puts a big cross permanently on his arm.
I don’t give a fuck about all that role model crap… that’s just shit the authorities like to use to try and curb the excesses of young, rich lads, that have all of what they can only dream of… or PC liberal drips that would have us all behaving like trained chimps if they had their way.
And if you are a parent, especially a father, and your son is looking to the likes of Rooney for his example of manhood… well, maybe you should be asking questions of yourself first.
Rooney will do, what Rooney will do… it’s now up to him to live with the consequences… if he can’t, then he will suffer a fuck of a lot more than the fans… and if he can, then why should we care?
Personally, I just hate dumb cunts who have it all, and piss it away out of sheer stupidity… but in the end, if he keeps banging away at opposing defenses, I’ll not lose any sleep.
Problem is… I think Rooney WILL suffer if he loses Coleen, and then I expect his game to tank as well… and that will piss me off…
WOW.
Brutal.
Why?
I would love to have that attitude but its been stripped from me by the missus!
Aye.I’m ashamed of you Alf, you have let the Rant forum down!
as Alf says so long has he bangs them;
– debts of over 700k gambling
– nees his nictotine fix so he pays 200 quid for a pack of marly lights
– shagging grannies
– hookers in hotels, blow jobs in clubs, pissing in the street and generally being a chavvy twat
whatever, so long as he can deliver for United, doesn’t affect the dressing room, I don’t give ten shits
Don’t worry he’s going to go to clinic
“The star made a series of calls to Coleen, mum to his ten-month-old son Kai, and promised to get help for his fixation with prostitutes.” – The Sun
Should give Tiger Woods a call.
They’d probably end up shagging each other tho
apparently fergie has known about this for a while but it lasted so long as the super-injunction did
best thing is for rooney to come clean about all the ho’s and not let it drag
Fucking ridiculous the way people try to include smoking and pissing in the street into this story as if they’re in any way comparable and indicative of his character.
which is why i said i don’t give a fuck about it you tool. character has fuck all to do with it, so long as he delivers on the pitch, doesn’t affect the dressing room, and doesn;t do something completely left-field like bumming up Rio or is caught downloading pictures of Gary Glitter, I don’t care.
Clearly, Rooney is a twat but thankfully twats are allowed to play football.
No-one seems to have considered the possibility that Rooney’s wife might have given her prior consent to him going with a prostitute; a woman who is pregnant can react any number of ways including not wanting physical contact with anyone other than the unborn child; I’m not presuming anything about Colleen but she might be one of those women who would put the needs of her partner above her own; remember the Avram Grant hooker story last year?
I’m going to reserve my judgement on the Rooney story until it unfolds and we hear the facts (not that my judgement makes any difference to anyone but me).
There’s a lot of shit being written about Rooney. The tabloid shithouses are frabricating stories in order to shift a few extra units. It seems people will believe anything at the minute.
Apparently his poor World Cup form was because of this prozzy, hah
And being pictured smoking & drinking on holiday is a clear indication he’s going off the rails – total shite
He’s gonna get booed by the Ingerland cunts now for sure
But what do people expect from footballers? They are like rockstars; rich, dumb, total arseholes etc. Why do people expect a certain amount of morality and respect?
It’s like being outraged that Axl Rose turned up half an hour late at Leeds Fest, acted like a cock on stage and fucked off 7 times between songs to do a line of coke. What an outrage!!
i think that was the funniest, that fact that he was with hookers made him shit at the world cup, ffs?
or could it be the fact that Rooney was just crap / injured / bottled it?
it’s like the hookers “explain everything” – like the goaly turning into a spazza in the first game – yep blame that on Rooney’s nicotine habit
Aye. Oliver Holt thinks Rooney was shite because he was ‘racked with guilt’ over this prozzy business http://www.mirrorfootball.co.uk/opinion/columnists/oliver-holt/Oliver-Holt-on-Wayne-Rooney-The-mystery-of-the-scowl-comes-to-the-forefront-after-sex-scandal-revelations-article572213.html
Nothing to do with the points I made in the other Rooney thread – the fact that he was playing in an England team alongside the mighty Gareth Barry & James Milner
sidney – He supposedly slept with the hooker from June – October 2009. His guilt only came to the fore when playing for England in the World Cup then?! Yeah, that’s obviously nonsense.
And there’s certainly no “irony” in the timing of these “allegations…
what i don’t get is if there was a gagging order why was it released now – timing wise were the authorities involved so put pressure on courts to only release after the WC?
and apparently fergus knew about this long ago – so did United players, etc?!
the slag obviously had the story in the bag a months ago but decided to cash in for max impact i.e., after WC. NOTW and The Sun no doubt supervising the timing of this story.
danniitronix – yes I don’t think public reaction to NotW releasing the story in the summer would have been good. Would have led to accusations of ruining England’s World Cup bid. Timing has certainly been planned carefully. It’s all very staged.
@danniitronix
my comment made no reference to you and in fact supported your earlier point yet you felt the need to call me a tool.
thanks for that.
The press and the Ingerland mongs are desperate for reasons why we were shit in the World Cup
The reasons according to the press & Ingerland muppets:
The manager is foreign
The manager is not English
The manager is not a cockney
The manager doesn’t let the players play X Box in the hotel
John Terry
All the foreigners in the Premier League
442
And now, Rooney was racked with guilt because he’s a cunt
At no point has anybody mentioned the shockingl average awfulness of Gareth Barry or the fact that England can’t pass the ball, even to the level of the North Koreans
Didn’t Terry also moan about not being allowed to have a beer?
@Triggs – apologies.
Hmmm…danni’s the naughty boy!