Hot Football Transfer Gossip: Man Utd 'want to swap Rooney for Lukaku', Barcelona 'target Alonso'

Remember when Jose Mourinho tried to sign Wayne Rooney from Manchester United while offloading Romelu Lukaku to Everton?

We’ll jog your memory. It was 2013, he was the manager of Chelsea and, in hindsight, it wasn’t his finest hour as a transfer market strategist – a point illustrated by the fact that, today, he is reportedly attempting to pull off the exact opposite move.

The Mail says Mourinho has made Lukaku, the player he repeatedly rejected at Stamford Bridge, his “top transfer target” for the summer and will offer Rooney to Everton as part of the deal.

The Toffees want £100m for the Belgian striker, while the Red Devils value their record goalscorer at an equally optimistic £17m – price tags that reflect the contrasting career trajectories of these two men in the four years since Mourinho’s ill-judged attempt to swap them.

He ultimately failed to sign Rooney in 2013, and today’s mooted exchange deal could also be tricky because the England captain will reportedly “not accept being a makeweight”. So even after all these years, the Roonster still thinks he’s better than Lukaku.

Man Utd are also being linked with a £50m move for Real Madrid playmaker James Rodriguez and the source for this rumour seems pretty watertight – it’s “Colombians”.

According to the Mirror, “Colombians are convinced” that James is bound for Old Trafford. It transpires that the paper is specifically referring to the Colombians who work for national channel RCN Radio, who have claimed the 25-year-old has a “pre-agreement” (whatever that is exactly) to replace Rooney in Manchester. Whether these are trustworthy Colombians, we have no idea.

The latest twist in the increasingly remarkable life story of Marcos Alonso will be a big-money summer move to Barcelona, predicts Spanish paper Mundo Deportivo. Chelsea boss Antonio Conte will, however, do his best to crush that fairytale and keep the left-back at Stamford Bridge.

But then that depends on Conte staying at Stamford Bridge himself, as the Sun suggests the title-winning Italian has been offered a “world record deal” to move to Inter Milan.

In a heartwarming tale from the Mirror, it is claimed that Middlesbrough defender Ben Gibson will stay with his boyhood club despite relegation to the Championship. The £25m-rated centre-back is wanted by Chelsea and Liverpool, but Boro boss Steve Agnew thinks he will stay on Teesside. And when a man of Steve Agnew’s stature speaks, you listen,

Elsewhere, West Ham and Everton will battle to sign Swansea’s £25m-rated midfielder Gylfi Sigurdsson in the summer (Mirror), Manchester City and Liverpool are keen on Southampton left-back Ryan Bertrand (ESPN) and Sunderland forward Fabio Borini has a relegation clause in contract that means he can now leave the Stadium of Light for £6m (Telegraph). Don’t all queue up at once, guys.

@darlingkevin