I made a promise to Wayne Rooney because of the extraordinary thing he did for me one night, reveals KATIE HIND. Because of his behaviour, I’ve had to break it…but it reveals the kind of man he is

My heart pounded as I rummaged through my gold purse. My phone disappeared while I was in a hotel bar in London. Please leave it in my bag, I prayed.

Before I completely collapsed, the man sitting across from me started searching on the floor and told me not to worry and that it would happen.

That man was Wayne Rooney, the star striker of Manchester United and England at the time. We enjoyed a late drink at the Royal Lancaster Hotel after he was named Player of the Year by the prestigious Football Writers’ Association in the spring of 2010.

After flying in for the night from Mallorca, where he was on holiday with his wife Coleen and their baby Kai (who stayed in the sun while Wayne flew back for the holidays), he celebrated with a nightcap and a chat with me after a colleague had arranged that. to meet us.

Clearly impressed by Wayne, then only 24, I took my eyes off my beloved Blackberry for a moment and it was swiped from under my nose.

I called the waiters for help and asked Wayne’s manager, the terrifying Paul Stretford, who was sitting next to him, if he had seen it. Nothing.

Then a miracle happened: Wayne saw two women hanging around our table and called them over. He insisted that one of them open her purse, which she did, and seconds later he grabbed my phone and handed it back to me.

Delighted, I hugged Wayne. He was furious on my behalf and insisted that the women be thrown out of the luxury hotel. As we left, I thanked him profusely and promised that I would never write a bad word about him. Considering his behavior in the ensuing years, it’s a promise I’ve had to break.

But since that night I have called Wayne, now the manager of Championship team Plymouth Argyle, my knight in shining armor, and whenever any of his critics dare to criticize him, I jump to his defense.

And now, thanks to Coleen joining the I’m A Celebrity jungle, I’m no longer the only one who sees him as a thoroughly decent man.

His drunken antics have earned him a bad-boy image that he can’t shake, but now it looks like Coleen’s starring role on the show is also helping to rehabilitate her troubled husband.

For those unaware of Wayne’s crimes, they started 20 years ago, when he was just a teenager playing for Everton and was caught paying prostitutes in a Liverpool brothel.

It was then revealed in 2009 that he had enjoyed a threesome with escorts Jenny Thompson and Helen Wood at the five-star Lowry Hotel in Manchester while Coleen was pregnant with Kai (they now have four boys: Kai, 14, Klay, 11, Kit, eight and Cass, six).

Wayne’s most recent offense took place in the summer of 2017, when he was arrested for driving Cheshire estate agent Laura Simpson’s car while over the drink-drive limit. Coleen was pregnant with Cass at the time.

But all that was long forgotten last weekend when proud Wayne, who has been watching Coleen on the ITV series every night since the ITV series began on November 17, posted a message on social media praising his wife and encouraged his followers to vote for her for a Bushtucker trial.

He wrote on Instagram: ‘Me and the boys would love to see her take a test and we know she wants to test herself… let’s go vote.’

Wayne’s calls were answered: during Saturday’s episode, Coleen, 38, received the highest number of votes to undergo the trial, alongside BBC Radio 1 presenter, Dean McCullough, 32. Surprised by his influence on the public mood, Wayne joked on X: ‘I think I’m going to get into trouble here. Success!

He also appeared on Jungle spin-off show I’m A Celebrity…Unpacked, telling host Joel Dommett: ‘I’d love to see Coleen do a trial, I think she’d be great, really good at them also.

Coleen with her boys – Kit, Kai, Wayne, Klay and Cass

‘I think she shows her kind and caring personality and her character, which comes across strongly. It’s great to see her there and settling in over the last few days.”

Wayne said he missed his wife of 16 years ‘so much’, saying the past two weeks have been the longest they have not spoken since they met as 12-year-olds on a council estate in Croxteth, Liverpool.

He said: ‘It’s been the longest time I haven’t spoken to her since we were kids. It is of course difficult for the children not to be able to talk to their mother.

‘Coleen’s parents are a huge help as I currently live there in Plymouth with my work. There is a good team that looks after the children and makes sure that everything happens with the children. We miss her, but we also enjoy watching her.”

Coleen’s Bushtucker trial was certainly a gruesome ordeal. She was locked in the back of a van filled with hordes of cockroaches, rats, giant mealworms and crickets. But she was unflappable and successfully won nine stars for the camp alongside Dean.

Somewhat predictably, as soon as it emerged that Coleen was jetting off to Australia – 10,000 miles away from the family’s £20million super estate in Cheshire – there were lurid rumors on social media that Wayne might take the opportunity to be a boy again become. . But associates of the 39-year-old star say he is living a quiet life these days in Salcombe, Devon, while he is at work, before driving back to Cheshire as soon as possible.

“Wayne and Coleen are so solid,” said a friend. ‘He’s so proud of her and is at home keeping things together for when she comes back. That’s what he focuses on.

Enduring the I’m A Celebrity Bushtucker trial which saw Coleen locked in the back of a van with hordes of cockroaches, rats, giant mealworms and crickets

The couple has endured very public ups and downs, and their loyalty has been tested, but they have weathered the storm

‘There are no temptations, he just gets on with his job, is a dad and of course watches I’m A Celeb with a takeaway. It’s not what people probably imagine, but this is the grown-up Wayne.”

He was said to be ‘angry’ over vile sexual chants about his wife by Watford fans at Plymouth’s Home Park Stadium last Friday.

Insiders at the football club say they were all ‘shocked’, especially as Wayne was involved in local outreach projects to support vulnerable women.

A spokesperson for the club told me they work closely with the charities Trevi, which provides safe spaces for women recovering from abuse and violence, and MAN: Culture, which provides a space for men and boys to have honest conversations about masculinity and male violence against women. women.

“Wayne has found himself as he approaches 40 next year,” says a source close to the star.

‘He has always struggled with fame and it has manifested itself in many different ways, but he is now content and can’t wait for Coleen to come home as queen of the jungle!’