Striker Wayne Rooney [Images] married his childhood sweetheart Coleen McLoughlin before family and close friends on Thursday at a 17th century villa on the Italian Riviera.

The deputy mayor of the Ligurian coast town of Santa Margherita Ligure presided over the ceremony on a rainy morning within the frescoed walls of Villa Durazzo, officials said.

The couple, both aged 22, then headed to a medieval abbey perched on a hill for their reception.

The bride wore a short, low-cut, cream-white dress while the groom donned a more sportive look in a beige suit without a tie, ANSA news agency reported.

The ceremony, accompanied by a violin orchestra, lasted just 20 minutes.

"She was wearing a marvellous white dress," Gianni Costa, the deputy mayor who married the two, told Reuters. "He was dressed more casually. It was a very special and intense ceremony."

The couple and guests arrived in cars with tinted windows, preventing a gaggle of reporters and photographers waiting outside the villa gates from getting a peek at the attendees.

The three days of festivities are to include celebrations aboard a large yacht and the guests will all release butterflies at the same moment, Italian media reported. The couple hosted a more raucous wedding-eve party on the boat Wednesday.

"They were here with their yacht, the music was very loud and the lights very bright," said local resident Vittorio Cervi.

"They sailed towards Genoa at about midnight."

• Complete football coverage