LAST WEEK we saw the unedifying face of professional football as the tedious “will he, won’t he?” Wayne Rooney fiasco ground its way to a perfectly predictable conclusion.

Rooney’s public wrangling over a five-year-contract, reputedly worth £1m a month, looked crass in a week Government cutbacks consigned halfa- million people to the dole queue.

Maybe we should not be surprised.

So many of today’s professional footballers are just hired hands – mercenaries willing to sign for the club waving the biggest contract.

Players like Alan Shearer, who shunned a big money move to play for his home club, are the exception rather than the norm.

It was not always like this.

Arthur Wharton, who signed for Darlington in 1884, could have been a world-class athlete. Instead, he became the world’s first black professional footballer.

Wharton played football during a more innocent era when players turned out for the love of the game not the size of their bank balance.

Tonight, the Football Association will donate a five-figure sum to honour this most unassuming North-East sporting pioneer on the 125th anniversary of Wharton’s birth.

We welcome the FA’s generous donation, but the main plaudits should go to Darlington businessman Shaun Campbell, who started the campaign to commemorate Wharton’s achievements and led the line with quiet determination.

Arthur Wharton would be proud.