Wayne Rooney has revealed England legend Paul Gascoigne has a good memory when it comes to money.
Manchester United’s record goalscorer first came across ‘Gazza’ when he was scoring goals for fun in the Everton academy and Gascoigne was winding down his career at Goodison Park.
He’d often be seen watching the club’s youth games and in 2000 he was in attendance to see the teenage prodigy play, entering the changing room afterwards to congratulate the 14-year-old on his performance.
Speaking to ‘Back of the Net’ on Amazon Prime, Rooney recalled: “I remember Gazza coming to see us in the changing room and asking ‘Is anyone going out tonight? I’ll give you a bit of money’.
“Me being confident I say ‘yes’, and Gazza came up to me and gave me £40. It was only a few years ago when I saw him again, he asked for his £40 back!”
Speaking on Soccer AM in 2015 Gascoigne remembered the encounter with a confident Rooney, who joined Manchester United for £30m in 2004 after scoring 17 goals in 77 games for Everton and starring for England at Euro 2004.
“After the game I went in and said ‘well done lads, I’ve got £40 spare, is anyone going out tonight?” Gascoigne said.
“Wayne Rooney said ‘I am’, so I went there’s £40 quid, go and get yourself a couple of pints tonight. That’s when I knew he was going to be brilliant. He’s got potential, that lad.
“He’s never given the £40 back so the interest is about £1.2million now!”
In 2002, two years after the meeting, Rooney made his debut in the Everton first-team and memorably scored a stunning last-minute winner against Arsenal at Goodison Park.
When he re-joined Everton in 2017, he was met a few months later by Gascoigne and the pair embraced, as the latter jokingly gave him the same amount of money he had 18 years earlier.
The 34-year-old spent a season with his boyhood club, scoring 10 goals and will join Derby as a player-coach in January, having seen out the remainder of the 2019 Major League Soccer season with DC United.
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