Family got shirty over Rash pick
BYE BYE SKIPPER: Rooney’s England career may be over after he missed Southgate’s speech MARCUS RASHFORD has revealed how members of his family tried to sway him to the blue half of Manchester over the years by buying him a series of City shirts for birthday and Christmas presents.
“Coming from Manchester, families can be divided – at least mine was,” said the United striker. “Half my family were United supporters and the other half City. So these kits they used to get me were more than gifts, you know what I mean?
“Especially as I got older and I kept getting better at football, my uncles would buy me the newest red or blue kits to try to bring me over to their side. It was a bit of a running joke in our family.”
However, from the moment he was given a red England No9 Rooney shirt in 2006, there was only one thing holding him back.
His mum Melanie refused to allow him to cross the main road between their house and the local park without the accompaniment of one of his older brothers.
“When I was about eight my uncle gave me that Rooney kit,” added Rashford. “As every kid does, when you’re having a kickabout and you’ve got someone’s name on your back, you try to follow in their footsteps.
“I was a striker, so from that day I wanted to be like Rooney. And I wanted to play for England.
“But here’s the other thing about where we grew up in Manchester: the park was on the other side of a busy main road.
“If Dane and Dwaine had left, my mum would never let me go out alone to cross the road and join them. ‘You’ll have to wait, Marcus’, she’d say. ‘Wait here’. She wasn’t having it.”
Rashford is expected to be among those sporting the new Nike England away kit against Germany tomorrow and his early experiences give a glimpse into how he has held his own so young.
“We’d have games on the green in front of our council estate,” he said. “These dreams bonded us. The boys from the neighbourhood, we’re still mates – even after some of us got scouted and left for academies after I left for United.
“I loved competing against the older boys.”