ROONEY TROUBLES NOT SETTLED YET

Wayne Rooney is still heading for a High Court showdown with News International this year despite the fact that a £100,000 payout has halted his plans to sue The Sun and News of the World over claims he slapped his girlfriend Coleen McLaughlin.

Merseyside lawyer David Kirwan has confirmed that he still plans to take The Sun to court over an August 2004 story which he said wrongly claimed Rooney slept with Patricia Tierney — a woman The Sun dubbed the "haggard hooker" and "auld slapper". Tierney is the claimant in that case, but Rooney could be called as a witness.

The Sun's lawyers tried to get the trial moved to London, from Liverpool, after they claimed the paper could not have a fair trial in the city because of its controversial coverage of the 1989 Hillsborough disaster.

As a compromise, the trial is to be held in Manchester and, according to Kirwan, it is due to take place towards the end of the year.

Tierney, 52, is a married mother of seven, and grandmother of 16, who says she has never been a prostitute, but had been a part-time receptionist at a massage parlour for three weeks.

Both The Sun and the News of the World have published apologies over stories of the argument between Rooney and McLaughlin, which they now admit were false.