Rooney reveals drinking and anger battles

Wayne Rooney has spoken about his battle with binge drinking and anger during his playing career and revealed a determination to prove himself a success in the dugout by learning from his own mistakes.

The former England captain is cutting his managerial teeth at English second-tier strugglers Derby County and turned down an approach to be interviewed for the Everton job.

In a wide-ranging interview with the Mail on Sunday before the release of Amazon Prime Video documentary 'Rooney', the 36-year-old recalled the battles he went through after breaking into the Premier League as a raw 16-year-old talent at Goodison Park and later securing a big-money move to Manchester United.

"I had made a lot of mistakes when I was younger, some in the press and some not in the press, whether that's fighting or whatever," Rooney said.

"For me to deal with that, deal with stuff that was in the newspapers, deal with the manager at the time, deal with family at the time, was very difficult.

"In my early years at Manchester United, probably until we had my first son, Kai, I locked myself away really. I never went out.

"There were times you'd get a couple of days off from football and I would actually lock myself away and just drink, to try to take all that away from my mind.

"Locking myself away made me forget some of the issues I was dealing with. It was like a binge."

Rooney felt he had been "in a really bad place" before working through the issues, going on to become the record goalscorer for both Manchester United and England.

"I was trying to figure out how to deal with it by myself. Growing up on a council estate, you would never actually go and speak to anyone," he said.

"You would always find a way to deal with it yourself. It was