ROO LUVS YOU.. EXCLUSIVE

THIS is the 16-year-old girl who has stolen the heart of England's young football superstar Wayne Rooney.

Schoolgirl Colleen McLoughlin was the first person Wayne, 17, wanted to see when he came home from his record-breaking game as the youngest footballer ever to play for England.

A friend dropped him off at Colleen's home as he tried to get over the disappointment of England's 3-1 defeat against soccer also-rans Australia.

Colleen and the Everton superkid have been going out for six months and he spends hours at her mum and dad's in a neat terraced house, which is near the council home in Liverpool where Wayne still lives with his family.

During the week Wayne often drops in at the high school where Colleen is studying for A-levels and waits for her in the students' common room.

"They are very close, but I think Wayne is keener than she is," said a friend of the couple.

"She likes him because he is romantic and buys her presents and treats her nicely."

Colleen is believed to have travelled to London with Wayne's mother Jeanette and father Wayne Senior to see her boyfriend's international debut - aged just 17 years and 111 days - at Upton Park on Wednesday.

Wayne is the highest-paid teenage footballer in Britain after signing a new deal with Everton worth pounds 13,000 a week.

But friends say he does not flaunt his wealth and he and Colleen are like any other teenage couple and mix with a small group of trusted pals.

"He doesn't throw his money around," said one. "He still hangs out with the mates he grew up with and playing for England won't change that.

"I suppose some time he is bound to move on. But he will always be able to come back here because he is one of us."

One of Wayne's first teams was the under-12s side run by a local pub, the Western Approaches.

"He comes in and sits with his mates in the same spot and rarely speaks to anyone else," says a former barmaid who has known Wayne since he was a youngster. "And he only drinks coke. He can be quite shy, but he always remembers his 'pleases' and 'thank-yous', although he has a wicked smile.

"Wayne sometimes comes in the pub with his dad too. The Rooneys are a lovely family. This can be a bit of a rough area, but they have never been in any trouble."

Wayne Senior is a lifelong Everton supporter who was a successful amateur boxer in his youth. One friend said: "Colleen's dad was also a boxer in his day. Both families are very close and have so much in common""

Wayne's former agent Peter McIntosh, the man who discovered him, added: "Even if he was turning out for Real Madrid, Wayne would still go home to his mates after a game.

"He's not been brought up to be big-headed, that's not his way.

"He was so good that he grew up playing football with lads three or four years older. But after a game he always went back to lads of his own age.

"When he pulls on a football jersey, whether it's Everton or England, he is Superman. When he takes his shirt off, he is Clark Kent again.

"That's how he is off the pitch... just an ordinary lad."

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