Wayne Rooney shares what he really thinks of Jose Mourinho as a person after working with him at Man United

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Wayne Rooney has shared what he really thinks of former Manchester United boss Jose Mourinho.

The Manchester United legend played under the Portuguese boss at Old Trafford during the 2016-17 campaign.

Despite starring under Louis van Gaal beforehand, Wayne Rooney struggled to make a similar impact under Jose Mourinho and fell down the pecking order after the arrival of Zlatan Ibrahimovic. 

Rooney rejoined Everton in the summer of 2017 after 14 years in Manchester, while Mourinho would remain in charge at Old Trafford until December 2018. 

And while Rooney has admitted he was frustrated to see his role lessen during Mourinho’s reign, he’s labelled the Portuguese boss as a ‘really good’ person.

Rooney shares honest opinion on Mourinho

Speaking on The Overlap, Rooney discussed his relationship with the former United boss.

“That was probably my toughest year at United because I was captain but wasn’t playing,” he told Stick To Football. “I knew as soon as he came in and signed Zlatan, Jose only plays one way he plays one forward, and he brought Zlatan in so I knew I wouldn’t be playing.

“He started the season with me and Zlatan up top and started really well, I scored three goals and two assists in the first few games, and then we played Norwich away and I was terrible – the whole team was bad.

“But I was disappointed because I gave him the chance to take me out of the team and then from then I never got back in. That was the most difficult thing, going in every day as captain and trying to put on a face for your teammates like he brought me on with 30 seconds to go in my last game, the Europa League final.

“I was on the bench against Southampton in the League Cup final and was ready to come on but then Zlatan scored and he sat me back down.

“As a person, great, honestly, really really good fella. But when you don’t play you have your issues with any manager as you want to play, but really good person.”

As brilliant as Rooney was over the years for United, he was arguably slowing down at this stage of his career.

Nevertheless, it must have been frustrating for the Englishman to see a player who was his senior by four years ultimately take his place in the side.

But there are clearly no hard feelings between Rooney and Mourinho and in truth, it was probably the right time for the United legend to move on.