Wayne Rooney confirms he’s chasing full-time Derby job as ‘ambitious’ Man Utd legend moves into coaching
WAYNE ROONEY has confirmed he wants to become Derby’s next boss.
The England and Manchester United legend, 35, claims he would lack ambition if he did not want to take over the rock-bottom Championship club.
We revealed on October 15 that Rooney was in line to replace Phillip Cocu, who was axed on Saturday.
Rooney, one of four interim Rams bosses, said: “I wouldn’t be an ambitious person if I didn’t want the job.
“My ambition is to go into management, especially when you see the likes of Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard and Scott Parker all getting good jobs and doing really well.
“We have to get the next two or three games out the way first.
"But if they go well it puts us all in a better position to put our names forward for that role.”
Rooney has addressed ways of how he can help Derby climb up the table with the club winning just once in 11 games this term.
He added: "The big thing we need to bring back to the players and into our game is simplicity.
“You can over-complicate things and that’s not always great for players in this position.
FROM 2004 LIONS TO THE DUGOUT
TEN of England’s starting XI against Portugal at Euro 2004 have now gone into coaching or management. Here is what they have done.
DAVID BECKHAM: England (2010, coach).
DAVID JAMES: Kerala Blasters (2018, manager).
PAUL SCHOLES: Oldham (2019, manager), Salford (2014-, owner; 2020, manager).
WAYNE ROONEY: Derby (2020-, caretaker manager).
GARY NEVILLE: England (2012-16, assistant) Valencia (2015-16, manager).
STEVEN GERRARD: Liverpool (2017-18, youth coach), Rangers (2018-, manager).
FRANK LAMPARD: Derby (2018-19, manager), Chelsea (2019-, manager).
ASHLEY COLE: Derby (2018-19, coach), Chelsea (2019-, coach).
SOL CAMPBELL: Macclesfield (2018-19, manager), Southend (2019-20, manager).
JOHN TERRY: Aston Villa (2018-, assistant).
MICHAEL OWEN: None
"Different messages, different line-ups, different ways of playing.
“When you’re struggling and not winning games of football you are always thinking of different ideas of how you get out of that run of bad form. But often the best way out of that is simplicity.
“As a player you learn, as your career goes on, that if you give the ball away two or three times, the next time the ball comes to you, keep it simple and naturally your confidence grows.
“Then you can start making more difficult passes again. I think it’s the same with players.
"Make things simple, don’t overcomplicate by feeding them information which will frazzle their heads.
“Just do the simple things right and everything will fall into place.”