There was one priority for Coleen Rooney when, after three weeks of being cut off from the outside world in the Australian jungle, she was finally given her phone back.
‘I called Wayne as soon as I got in the car,’ she told me in 2024, having just been named runner-up on I’m A Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!
She was unaware that her husband, who remained in the UK, had worked tirelessly to drum up a campaign on social media and breakfast television to get the public to demand she do one of the notorious Bushtucker Trials – which involved a revolting meal of blended crocodile anus!
On hearing this, she beamed and admitted: ‘I’m glad he did because I was desperate to do a trial.
‘At that time I thought, “What’s the point in coming here if I’m not doing any trials?” I’m glad he did that.’
Then, seemingly buoyed by the revelations about her husband’s support, the mother-of-four, 39, decided to give me a rare glimpse inside her 24-year relationship with the former Manchester United and England star.
She revealed just how close they really are, suggesting they are normally in constant communication.
‘We speak a number of times a day, we FaceTime,’ she explained. ‘Not having that communication [in the jungle], it’s been tough.
‘Wayne just said how proud he was of me and that he’s never missed me as much as now.
‘I can understand that because we’ve been apart for weeks and weeks on end.’
Those in Coleen and Wayne’s inner circle know that, despite what sometimes seems to be a tumultuous relationship, they have navigated fierce public scrutiny together over the past two decades.
And that, as a result, they have built a deep understanding and a watertight partnership.
Her marriage to Wayne, 40 – whom she first met growing up in Liverpool when they were both 12 – has not been without its scandals, of course.
Even before they tied the knot in a glamorous ceremony in Portofino on the Italian Riviera in 2008, Wayne had admitted to sleeping with prostitutes and had been caught on CCTV at a backstreet Liverpool brothel.
One of the women in question was a 48-year-old grandmother known as ‘Auld Slapper’ who wore a rubber catsuit.
Then, in 2009, came a threesome with two more prostitutes, Helen Wood and Jenny Thompson, at The Lowry Hotel in Manchester.
More recently, in 2017, he was caught driving the car of another woman, Cheshire-based estate agent Laura Simpson, while over the drink-drive limit and without a convincing explanation for why he was behind the wheel.
But Coleen stood by him throughout.
So, when last weekend’s pictures emerged showing Wayne in the lobby of the Soho House members’ club in Manchester in the early hours of Saturday morning accompanied by two women, eyebrows were raised.
Earlier, he had been at the pre-Brit Awards party, where the former striker was seen getting into the spirit of things – and at one point had difficulty doing up his suit trousers as he emerged from the bathroom – as he drank with the same two women.
Yet sources close to the couple have insisted: ‘Wayne hasn’t done anything wrong.’
They told the Daily Mail that the footballer had been out with a friend when he ‘sat next to a woman and chatted to her but went home alone.
‘Coleen is aware of the situation and is extremely protective of Wayne. She knows he has a drinking problem but is disappointed in the people who take advantage of him when he drinks.’
The insider continued: ‘Her view has long been that women circle him – and that’s how these situations arise.’
Behind the scenes, the couple have spent the past two decades quietly dealing with the footballer’s struggles with alcohol, which is one reason Coleen has stood by her man despite his misdemeanours.
In September last year, Wayne spoke for the first time about his booze problems and revealed that he could have died if Coleen hadn’t been there to help him.
‘I honestly believe if she weren’t there, I’d be dead,’ he told his close friend and former team-mate Rio Ferdinand in an interview on Ferdinand’s podcast.
‘Coleen is the best. I’ve made mistakes in the past which are well-documented but… she keeps me on [the right] path and she’s done it for 20-odd years.
‘I wanted to go out and enjoy my time with my friends and have a night out. It got to a point where I went too far – that was a moment in my life where I was struggling massively with alcohol.
‘I didn’t think I could turn to anyone. I didn’t really want to because I didn’t want to put that burden on anyone.
‘I just drank for two days straight. At the weekend, I’d score two goals – and then I’d go back and drink for two days straight again.
‘She’s helped me control that massively. She’s managed me because I needed managing.’
Whenever Coleen is asked publicly about her relationship with Wayne, she has the same answer: ‘We’ve had our ups and we’ve had our downs but we’ve had experiences that you would never have imagined.’
Just two days after the photographs of Wayne emerged, Coleen was spotted out and about in Cheshire without her wedding ring, fuelling rumours of a split.
But friends say she never wears her ring to Pilates or gym sessions and there was nothing unusual about her having left it at home.
Boasting a collection of no fewer than five engagement rings, worth up to £2.9million, Coleen is known to be careful with her jewellery.
Today, the couple live in a £20million Cheshire mansion with their four sons Kai, 16; Klay, 12; Kit, ten; and Cass, eight.
The two youngest flew out to Australia to greet Coleen as she emerged on the I’m A Celebrity bridge, while the elder two remained at home.
After her success on the ITV show, Coleen surprised Wayne with a three-day party in the Cotswolds.
When asked on a recent podcast if he was making plans for his wife’s forthcoming 40th birthday in April, he said: ‘I’m trying to but nothing would be good enough.
‘Coleen is amazing, she does everything for the kids and me. She organises everything, it’s amazing that she’s there.’
My source added: ‘Whatever cruel rumours emerge about Wayne, he’s always just been focused on Coleen and the family.’
