Wayne Rooney: England boss Gareth Southgate admits days of boozing and chippies are over if Three Lions want real success

THE good news for Wayne Rooney is Gareth Southgate fondly remembers return trips from Crystal Palace away matches involving fish and chips, crates of beer and falling off the team coach drunk.

The bad news is that Southgate is adamant times have changed and that England’s players can no longer behave like that if they are ever to defeat major nations at the business end of the World Cup.

Which, incidentally, England have never done on foreign soil. Ever.

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Images of a red-eyed Rooney looking the worse for wear at 5am in the England team hotel during the last international break were a blast from the past.

From Southgate’s early days in the late 80s and 90s when boss Steve Coppell would tell Palace’s coach driver to pull up outside a chippy and an off-licence for provisions.

And England’s new manager said: “The days are gone when we did have beers after a game. Fish and chips and beer on the way home on the coach — and probably fall off the bus. The rest of the world aren’t doing that now.

“So we are competing in a different landscape and we have to be as professional and well-prepared as everybody else before we even start looking at how good we are technically or tactically.”

Southgate would not give any assurances about Rooney’s place in the England team, let alone his future as captain — a stark contrast to his predecessors Sam Allardyce and Roy Hodgson, who both fawned over the Manchester United skipper.

And Southgate, who is known to see his former Under-21 striker Harry Kane as captaincy material, spoke of the need for his players to police themselves.

He said: “We hear a lot that there aren’t enough leaders but I have seen some really good potential leaders among that lot. With the Under-21s in the last few years, there’s a group of senior players — although they’re young — and if standards aren’t met, they’re on to it.

“I think that’s when you’ve got a good culture. That’s what I’d like to see in a team. If someone’s late for a gym session, they’re called out by their team-mates. I think that’s far more powerful than the headteacher coming in and cracking the whip.

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“If I’m a centre-back, and other centre-backs are in the gym at 10 o’clock, I want to be there at 9.30 because I want to be doing a bit more to get in the team. That’s a high-performance culture.”

It is not, therefore, about a captain going on the lash into the wee small hours.

Southgate’s man-management style is about treating his players like adults and expecting them to behave like grown-ups.

He was keen to point out that he did not personally ‘send Rooney to bed’ on that Saturday night at The Grove Hotel — but it is believed he did tell FA staff to diplomatically direct his skipper towards his room.  Only for Rooney to come back down in to the lobby to continue drinking.

Southgate said: “I think the only person I’ve told to go to bed, in the last few years, is my son, and he’s never too fussed about that discussion either.

“If I was to give you one bit of detail, it would be that the only time I saw Wayne was at about 10.30 that night. I was watching a video of Spain, which is a usual Saturday night for me!

“He popped his head in to see what we were doing as a group of coaches.”

Southgate claims English players will never respond to the hard-line disciplinarian approach of former boss Fabio Capello.

He says they will always need down-time during international breaks but expects them to be intelligent not to break his trust.

He said: “I’m not convinced that Draconian is going to work for English players, we have maybe had a go at that in the past, maybe with the Italians.

“There can’t be a regime where there’s no down-time. I’ve lived in that camp. Every elite sportsman’s got to have that switch-off.  But if they want to be top, top players, they have got to recognise what things are going to help us achieve that, and what things are going to detract from that. Many are working with top coaches at their clubs.

“They are going to see what is needed to be successful — and if we think we are good enough to take on the best in the world without doing everything right along the way, then good luck with that.”

On Rooney’s captaincy, Southgate was non-committal, knowing he does not have to make a decision until England’s next matches against Germany and Lithuania in March. He said: “I did change my captain in Slovenia and we’ve got great competition for places. I don’t know what the team is going to be for the games in March because it’s just impossible.

“If Wayne’s playing at his best and is able to contribute as he did against Scotland, then it would be ridiculous for me to dismiss that possibility.”

So Rooney captaining England is only a possibility under Southgate.

Which is a far cry from Hodgson and Allardyce giving him the run of the place.