Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho on Friday refused to be drawn on reports of renewed interest in Manchester United striker Wayne Rooney.
The Blues had two bids for Rooney rejected in the summer and there has been speculation Mourinho is ready to pounce and take advantage to snare the England striker if United fail to qualify for the Champions League at the end of the season.
Asked about Rooney, who is entering the final 18 months of his contract at Old Trafford, Mourinho shook his head and insisted he was not prepared to speak about a player from a team Chelsea are scheduled to face at Stamford Bridge a week on Sunday.
"I don't want to speak about it," Mourinho said.
"We play Man United in a few days. I don't think it's nice to speak about a Man United player.
"You have to ask him (Rooney). You have to ask the player. And Man United because Man United has a contract with the player that doesn't end at the end of the season."
Mourinho does not anticipate United will struggle to finish in the top four, despite David Moyes' men being five points adrift in seventh with 18 games left this season.
"I don't think they have a problem," the Chelsea boss added.
"In this moment they are not top four in the Premier League, but they can be at the end of the season.
"A new manager, but a club with a fantastic culture of supporting the manager.
"I don't feel any problem for David. He works. Better results will arrive and he will be for many years in the club and will reach good results."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article