Pedro Manchester United move wobbles with City interest, David de Gea being forced out to Real Madrid

There's a lot of bad news.

One, in the Mirror, is that Manchester City will challenge Manchester United for the signing of Pedro. That's only if Kevin de Bruyne does not try to force his way out of his club to City in the next couple of weeks. There's no need to be alarmed, with United able to offer the first-team minutes that City are less able to do so, because of the generally poor quality of United's squad in attack, when compared to the depth of the City squad.

Having said that, United might have already blown their chance with Pedro. According to Jamie Jackson in the Guardian (who, by the way, you might note has a poor track record in terms of reporting on United compared to other paper's United hacks), Louis van Gaal's treatment of Victor Valdes has put him right off the idea of coming to United. And who could blame him? It appears he's been telling porkies over David de Gea's attitude, too, which presumably is hardly fun for his mates in the squad.

De Gea is now training with the reserves and wasn't allowed to attend the match against Aston Villa. It really does appear that the fight has been picked by Van Gaal and not De Gea here. It's a risk, but not an impossible move from Van Gaal. It might upset plenty within the squad, but if he manages to get the side winning and playing well, that might convince a few who are upset to shut up. Equally, if your squad hates you, what's the chances of playing well? This story is in the Telegraph.

Also, Harry Kane says he wants to stay at Spurs for the foreseeable future, and Wayne Rooney is impossibly bad at football now.