15 years to the day since that goal from Wayne Rooney

October 19, 2002 saw a certain Wayne Rooney announced himself to the footballing world and launched a career that will go down in Premier League history.

Aged just 16, Rooney ended Arsenal's long unbeaten run with a sensational late strike from range, leading Arsene Wenger to say: "Rooney is the biggest England talent I've seen since I arrived in England. There has certainly not been a player under 20 as good as him since I became a manager here."

The wider footballing community is awash with stories about the first time people saw the teen sensation play with David Unsworth recalling that aged just 16 he was already making fools of established pros in training: "we couldn’t even catch him to kick him let alone tackle him."

Back then, Rooney was a precocious talent, a player that was playing U19 football at just 15 and generally mesmerising everyone who crossed his path.

After a string of stunning performances for the Everton youth side, Rooney joined up with the first team, making his debut whilst he was still at school before scoring that goal five days before his 17th birthday.

On this day in 2002, a 16 year old Wayne Rooney scored this wonder goal for Everton vs Arsenal. The rest is history. pic.twitter.com/OTK8sZgROG

— Classic Football (@ClassicFootbaIl) 19 October 2017

The strike made him the Premier League's all-time youngest ever goalscorer, though his record has since been broken twice.

A big-money move to Manchester United followed and whilst some would argue that he never reached his early potential, given that he is now Manchester United and England's all-time record scorer, we're sure that he won't have too many complaints.

Today, Rooney boasts 201 Premier League goals in 468 games, making him the second-highest goalscorer in the history of the competition and at the age of just 31, there is plenty of time for him to add to that tally.