Rooney speaks truth for his agent

Wayne Rooney has told a packed courtroom that his agent helped to make him a “very wealthy young man”.

Rooney and his 23-year old wife Coleen are refusing to pay commissions to Proactive sports management agency – dismissing their eight year contract with them was a ”mistake.”

Rooney appeared at Manchester Mercantile Court where he and wife Coleen and two of their companies are being sued by Stretford’s former company Proactive. The dispute over contracts came about when Stretford left the company in October 2008.

The young football prodigy was signed by Stretford in 2002 when he was just 17 playing for his home-town club Everton.

Stretford, a founder and director of Proactive, brokered multimillion-pound deals with firms including Nike and Coca-Cola for Rooney. He also took Rooney’s wife under his wing when her celebrity status exploded as the striker established himself as an England regular following his £20 million transfer to Manchester United in 2004.

Stretford struck deals with the couple to pay the company 20% commission. But trouble began in October 2008 when Stretford left the firm in acrimony – with no further commission payments made.

Last year, Stretford set up another company which Rooney agreed verbally to carry the contracts over to. Proactive claims the contract Stretford signed with the Rooneys while at the firm means it is entitled to further payments amounting to £4.3 million.

But Rooney appeared extremely loyal to Stretford, siding with him when he lost his job and was banned by the FA from acting as an agent.

Asked by Ian Mill QC, for Proactive, whether he believed Stretford had been treated badly, the player sprang to his defence, saying: “Before Mr Stretford was basically sacked from the company, nobody explained he was going to be sacked and that they could still do things for me.