Birmingham City have confirmed the appointment of Wayne Rooney as their new manager with the former England captain signing a three-and-a-half year contract with the club.
Rooney will be assisted by two familiar faces at St Andrew’s with ex-England left-back Ashley Cole and former Manchester United defender John O’Shea joining his coaching staff. Carl Robinson and Pete Shuttleworth, who worked with Rooney in the US, will also be in his backroom team.
The 37-year-old left his role as manager of MLS side DC United over the weekend and has replaced John Eustace who was controversially sacked by Birmingham’s new owners on Monday.
The club are currently 6th in the Championship table.
“I am absolutely delighted to be joining Birmingham City at such an exciting time,” Rooney, who began his managerial career with Derby County, said.
“It is very clear that they have a plan and are committed to realising their ambition for the club. We are fully aligned on what is expected. I have been building my managerial career, putting myself in challenging environments, to get me ready for this opportunity. It’s a project that gives me a sense of purpose and I can’t wait to get started.
“We have some exciting young players in the squad, and some who are still to break through into the first team, alongside a core of experienced senior professionals. I have a clear way that I want the team to play, and my coaching staff and I will work hard to implement it. We will create a winning culture here with an identity that gets Blues fans on their feet.
“I’ve played at St Andrew’s and Birmingham City fans were always loud and passionate about their team. It was a really difficult place to come as an opponent and now I get to experience what it is like to have them behind us. My job is to elevate the club to the next level and I can’t wait to get started. I know what the expectations are and our job is to deliver.”
Birmingham’s co-owner Tom Wagner added: “Wayne is a born winner. We believe, with the support of his coaching staff, the Club, and our supporters, he will take Blues forward on the next stage of our journey. His playing philosophy will help to realise the ambitions we have set for Birmingham City.
“Wayne has been preparing for an opportunity like this since he embarked on his coaching education whilst still a player at Manchester United. He and his staff have the full support of the Board and everyone at the football club.”
Analysis: Why Rooney to Birmingham makes perfect sense – for him if not the club
By Daniel Storey, i‘s chief football writer
There is something fitting, in the week after David Beckham’s new documentary was released, about Wayne Rooney taking a job at an earthy Championship club where his appointment will be unpopular with a large majority. The two superstars of consecutive England generations are roughly opposites in everything else.
Beckham is the smooth touchstone of every culture in which he has existed, one of those rare celebrities who acts as a snapshot in time. Manchester United’s Class of ’92 rose – Beckham was the poster boy. Footballers became celebrities – Beckham was the fashion icon. Ex-footballers earned wages that set them up for life – Beckham became an income generation machine, making money because he made money. Sport became intertwined with geopolitics – Beckham sang like a canary for Qatar.
Rooney’s persona appears simpler and, counterintuitively, therefore demands greater inspection. Whereas with Beckham we were always sold an image, with Rooney you saw nothing but the real thing for better and for worse. His transparency was the entirety of the image.
He was the street footballer kid, like so many other hundreds of thousands, who became a superstar through extraordinary talent and unbreakable determination. And yet somehow, despite all that, Beckham ended up being the more cherished of the two. Lesson: sometimes life is weird.
Click here to read Daniel’s analysis in full
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