Wayne Rooney insists he will never walk away from England
Tuesday 8 September 2015 20:53, UK
England captain Wayne Rooney insists he will never retire from international football.
The Manchester United striker can rewrite the history books on Tuesday - one goal for England against Switzerland will make him the country's all-time leading goal-scorer, surpassing Sir Bobby Charlton.
Twelve years after scoring his first international goal against Macedonia, Rooney insists his appetite to represent England remains as strong as ever.
England's qualification for Euro 2016 is already secure and it will be Rooney's seventh major international tournament with his country, but he has no plans to stop there.
"I won't be one to say I'm not available for selection," the United forward said.
"I'm sure it'll probably be the manager's choice more than mine. It's a huge honour to play for England.
"I feel I'm capable of going to Russia. After that, it may be a realistic time to see how I feel and if I feel it's not right for England or myself, I'll have a decision to make.
"Or the manager would have a decision to make. If I feel I can carry on, I'll try. But if the manager says he doesn't feel I'm in his plans for the next tournament, it's probably better I don't play in the qualifying games because I won't be going to the tournament."
Rooney scored his 49th goal for England against San Marino on Friday but he says it would mean a lot to him to break the record at Wembley.
"Wembley is probably the most iconic stadium in world football and it would mean a lot for me to do it there but it will happen where it's meant to happen," he said.
"If it does happen, it will be good to get it out of the way."
Rooney's former manager at Manchester United, Sir Alex Ferguson, revealed earlier this week that Rooney had turned United down twice as a teenager before eventually joining.
The England captain clashed with Ferguson at the end of their time together but Rooney insists those disagreements are now forgotten.
"I don't know if anyone knows how things ended," Rooney said.
"I still see Sir Alex quite a bit at games, and he travels away to European games with us. We had differences (of opinion). That's normal.
"I'm not the only person who had differences with Sir Alex Ferguson, but I can still sit here and say he was the greatest manager of all time. It's not that we don't like each other. We just had differences. That's normal."
