LONDON, July 25 - Wayne Rooney's soured
relationship with Everton manager David Moyes hastened his
departure to Manchester United, the England striker has said in
his autobiography.
Rooney, who joined United in 2004 for a fee estimated at 25
million pounds ($46.30 million), made his first-team
breakthrough at Goodison Park as a teenager.
"I would have gone almost anywhere just to get away from
David Moyes. If no-one had come in I would have joined
Newcastle," Rooney wrote in My Story So Far, serialised in the
Daily Mail.
"To me he appeared overbearing; just wanting to control
people. I suppose being young and confident and playing for
England at 17, I wasn't bothered about upsetting him or
answering back."
Rooney, a product of Everton's youth academy, made his
first-team debut as a 16-year-old in 2002 and two months later,
five days shy of his 17th birthday, became the Premier League's
youngest scorer (since surpassed by James Milner) when he netted
a superb match-winner against Arsenal.
His England debut followed in February 2003, a rapid rise to
fame that Rooney said irked the Everton manager.
"There was only one person who seemed a bit upset and
envious of what was happening to me - and that was Moyes," said
Rooney.