Wayne Rooney knocked on Sir Alex Ferguson’s door to complain about Man Utd signing

Wayne Rooney knocked on Sir Alex Ferguson’s door to complain about Manchester United’s transfer business with the forward reportedly particularly non-plussed by the signing of Chris Smalling.

A decade ago, United had been pipped to the Premier League title by Carlo Ancelotti’s Chelsea, though rather than respond with a marquee signing the club instead brought in several youngsters.

Marnick Vermijl was a youth signing from Standard Liege, Javier Hernandez arrived rather unheralded from Guadalajara, Bebe joined from Vitoria and Smalling completed a move from Fulham.

Rooney was far from impressed, feeling United were not showing the required ambition and fearing their decline, and looked set to leave when he rejected a new contract.

According to The Athletic, Rooney went to Ferguson’s office and confronted him in the summer of 2010 about the lack of investment and standard of players being signed.

He was said to feel the signing of Smalling in a £10m deal from Fulham was particularly unambitious for a club of United’s size, while they had failed to replace both Cristiano Ronaldo and Carlos Tevez.

But Ferguson managed to win over Rooney and both Smalling and Hernandez played significant roles as the Red Devils won back the Premier League title and made the final of the Champions League.

The Mexican striker scored an impressive 13 goals in 27 appearances in his debut season, becoming the side’s go-to super sub, while Smalling made 16 appearances in the league and went on to have a long career at Old Trafford.

He spent the past season on loan at Roma and enjoyed an excellent campaign in Serie A, with Ole Gunnar Solskjaer suggesting he will not buy a new centre-back and instead welcome Smalling back into the fold.

Bebe did not fare quite so well, though, making just two league appearances for United despite costing £7.4m and, after several loans, was sold to Benfica in 2014 at a loss.

Rooney, meanwhile, was handed a bumper new contract and agreed fresh terms in October 2010, though he would win just one more title after that season – in Sir Alex’s final campaign – during the rest of his United career.

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