Wayne Rooney – A Football Genius, but not a Role-Model Outside the Field

Wayne Mark Rooney. A name that is known all over the world. An absolute phenomenon of a player, who has broken not just one or two records. A national and club living legend, who has been able to produce some of the world’s best games, goals and assists. But even though he has been the hero of generations of kids, he is still a human being like all of us, with his own problems, bad habits and weaknesses. Since the start of his emulating career, Rooney’s name has always been in the papers, week in, week out, but not always for the right reasons.
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Wayne Rooney’s Gambling

There isn’t a Rooney fan in the world who hasn’t seen his temper or hasn’t read at least one story about his life outside football. Stories about drinking, gambling and even whoring have been published multiple times since the moment his career started. The England star has a well-known predilection for alcohol, with most of his reckless deeds being accompanied by booze, and gambling is not an exception. Multiple times, reports of Rooney’s gambling endeavours have emerged, most of which telling stories about tremendous losses. Even though gambling is a kind of entertainment, it is considered by many as a bad habit and a lot of people judge this kind of attitude. But does Wayne Rooney have a gambling problem? In the following chapters, we will have a look at some of his gambling sessions and try to establish is it an addiction or just a way of passing time.

Gambling in the Past

Waza always has had a weakness towards gambling. Casino games roulette and blackjack are among his favourites and more often than not, Rooney has been spending money on these tables. Among his favourite casino destinations is the 235 Casino in Manchester. Maybe calling him a regular there is a bit exaggerated, but he has visited the casino on more than enough occasions. Since 2008 when he reportedly lost around £65,000 in a couple of hours session at the casino, the football star has visited the club dozens of times, most of which ending with losses.

In 2006, Rooney reportedly faced an FA investigation after reports that he lost £700,000 in a ‘secret England dressing room gambling ring’. The same year his first book was published, called ‘My Story So Far’. According to it, his gambling career started in his second year at Everton, when he started to earn good money. He was putting small bets on horse racing, dog racing, or football matches; though having no particular predilection for it. Nevertheless, after about a year, he found himself void of £50,000, which was “stupid,” according to his own words. He managed to stop gambling for a few months (mostly because of his wife compelled him to), but then he was back again.

Reckless – £4000 per Minute

One of the most recent reports of Wayne Rooney spending time at the 235 Casino in Manchester was in 2017. The former England captain lost around £500,000 in just about 2 hours of play. That makes around £4000 per minute, which is quite impressive, but also irresponsible and careless. Came in alone around midnight, the Man Utd legend ran up the bill on roulette and blackjack. One witness said: “Wayne was extremely reckless, laying down chips which amounted to massive bets. He was chasing his losses which just made things worse for him. He kept losing but that just prompted him to bet more”. Putting long-shot bets on solo numbers on the roulette, constantly placing huge bets on red (which seems appropriate since that is the colour of the first kit of Manchester United) and betting on blackjack hands that obviously have low value and are likely to lose, were among the ways Rooney gambled away around half a million pounds.

Casino 235 in Manchester – One of the favourite gambling destinations for Wayne Rooney

Alcohol was, of course, involved again as another witness claimed:

“He was drinking bottles of beer. But he wasn’t drunk. He was more interested in gambling than drinking”.

Towards the end of his session, he was obviously looking a bit down and gloomy, despite the VIP treatment that he was receiving. But that is understandable, after all, nobody likes to lose, especially such a competitive person like Wazza. Around 2 am, he finally decided to draw the line and go home, as he left the casino fast and quietly, the same way he came in. Since that night, there haven’t been any stories about Rooney visiting the famous casino in Manchester, except once, when he spent a little over an hour, loosing just around 200 quid. After all, Rooney left Manchester in 2017, joining his boyhood club Everton, where he started his football career at the age of 9.

Coleen – the Light Guiding Wayne Into the Right Direction

Family and gambling are pretty much two incompatible words. The wife of Wayne Rooney, Coleen Rooney, is a sensible and successful businesswoman and a mother of four boys – Kai (born in 2009), Kley (born in 2013), Kit (born in 2016) and Cass (born in 2018). She met her future husband at the age of 12 in the Liverpool suburb of Croxteth. They began their relationship 4 years later and finally got married in 2008. She was labelled as ‘The nation’s favourite girl next door’.

Familywise, she has always been very protective and supportive, with a bit of a temper. Wayne himself described ‘she was furious’ after learning about his gambling endeavours in the early years of his career. Later on, she even reportedly vetoed the move of her husband to the Chinese Super League (which would have made him the world’s best-paid player at that time), because she didn’t want to let him spend so much time alone, worrying he might end up gambling again. After all, nearly 100% of the times when Wayne Rooney was involved in some sort of gambling activities, Coleen wasn’t around him, usually travelling with their kids. Another reported effort from her, after one of the times information about Rooney wasting money gambling came out in the media, was the fact that she told him to end his friendship with teammate Wes Brown. She believed he was a ‘bad influence’ on him and ending their friendship might help him stop gambling.

Alcohol is a ‘A’ Factor

In 2018 Rooney joined the MLS side D.C. United and moved with his family to Washington. Since then, there haven’t been any new news for any gambling activities, but pictures and reports of Rooney drinking haven’t stopped. He was arrested on a ‘profane swearing and intoxication in public’ at the end of 2018 and several months before that he was fined for drink-driving. His former England teammate and Liverpool’s legend Danny Murphy, now working as a BBC pundit was recently speaking on talkSport radio and said: “With Wayne, there has been a catalogue of events which are generally linked to alcohol, let’s make no bones about it. I’m sorry, that’s the truth.”

Wayne Rooney drinking beer

So maybe, one of the greatest players of all times does not have a gambling problem and don’t feel like gambling unless he’s had a couple of drinks. Hopefully, he has moved past his gambling desires and now just has to work on minimalizing his drinking. At least for now, until he officially retires from football and is no longer under the lights of the cameras all the time. Maybe it would’ve caused fewer problems for Rooney if he had played at online casinos, which are exceedingly popular nowadays and anonymous, so maybe the world would have never heard of his gambling problems. The online gambling market is crawling with casinos that give the same fun as a land-based casino. You can check out the list of the best online gambling sites in the UK and see the abundance of licensed online gambling operators.

But Why do Football Players Play Casino Games?

What is it about the modern game that makes so many gifted young players fall into gambling addiction? When your bank account bursts due to the amount of money in it, it’s not a big deal to spend a few thousand, or even hundreds of thousands, to please yourself. This issue concerns professional football players, whose salaries amount to millions of pounds per year. Placing huge bets at casinos is certainly not a problem and there are a lot of football players who like this kind of entertainment. Especially since the FA tightened its regulations in 2014 to stop players in England’s top 8 divisions betting on any football-related activity, not only in the UK but anywhere in the world. With the purpose of protecting the integrity and the future of the beautiful game, anyone who is privileged enough to be working or involved in football, from the players and managers, to the match officials and club staff is absolutely banned from football betting. The FA, the gambling commission and the betting companies have sophisticated systems to monitor and detect breaches of the betting rules and in case caught of violating these rules, FA charges, financial penalties and even bans apply. That is why, most of the football players who want to entertain themselves by gambling, often turn to the other side of the betting industry – the casino games. And one of the greatest English players of all time, Wayne Rooney, is one of them.

Final Words

Hopefully, everything will work out for the Rooney family and maybe in a couple of years, we will see one of the younger Rooneys conquer the heights of world football, just like his dad. Until then we hope one of the greatest football players our world has ever seen, starts to make smarter decisions and thinks about his loving family and his final years as a player. Players are human beings like everyone else and they need to live their lives, but they also need to be aware of their fame.

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