Wayne Rooney may be in trouble over controversial comments

Wayne Rooney has been contacted by the Football Association after claiming he deliberately set out to injure an opposition player in Manchester United’s Premier League match at Chelsea in 2006.

In a recent interview, Rooney, now the manager of Sky Bet Championship side Derby, admitted he changed his studs to “big, long metal ones to try and hurt someone”.

And it is understood that the FA has moved to seek observations from the 36-year-old following his controversial comments.

“We knew if Chelsea won then they had won the league that day,” said Rooney of the April 2006 trip to Stamford Bridge, where United would go on to lose 3-0.

“Until my last game for Derby, I always wore the old plastic studs with the metal tip.

“For that game I changed them to big, long metal ones – the maximum length you could have because I wanted to try and hurt someone, try and injure someone.

“I knew they were going to win that game. You could feel they were a better team at the time so I changed my studs.

“The studs were legal but thinking if there’s a challenge there I knew I’d want to go in for it properly, basically. I did actually.

“John Terry left the stadium on crutches. I left a hole in his foot and then I signed my shirt to him after the game…and a few weeks later I sent it to him and asked for my stud back.

“If you look back when they were celebrating, JT’s got his crutches from that tackle.”

Responding to Rooney’s comments, Terry tweeted with a number of laughing emojis: “Is this when you left your stud in my foot?”

Rooney finished his career as the all-time leading scorer for both England and United. He has been in permanent charge of Derby since January 2021.