Chelsea boss still interested in the Man United striker.
Chelsea Boss Jose Mourinho still holds hope that a deal can be made to bring Wayne Rooney to Stamford Bridge, despite Manchester United’s repeated desire to keep him.
While Mourinho avoided referring specifically to his ongoing pursuit of Rooney during a news conference at Chelsea’s Cobham training ground on Friday, he confirmed he will not abandon his efforts to land his number one target.
After Samuel Eto’o’s imminent departure from Anzhi Makhachkala led to links to Chelsea, with Eto’o saying he would like to work with his former Inter Milan coach again, Mourinho said he was flattered, but had priorities which lay elsewhere.
“For me as a manager, I’m happy that a player who worked with me before goes publicly and says he’d like to join me again,” said Mourinho, now in his second spell in charge of Chelsea.
“Especially a player like Samuel, a player with a big history in European football. But we are trying to get one player (Rooney) and we’ll see what happens. Before the transfer window closes, we’ll make decisions. The decisions can be different decisions.”
Mourinho added: “I’m just a Chelsea manager, and every one of us is looking always to try and strengthen your squad.
“We (managers) all say ‘no’ but we lie to the last day, when the market is open, because we’re all waiting for something to happen.
“Even if we say we’re very happy with our squad, we lie, because we always want to make it better.
“We’ll see what happens, not just with us but with Manchester United.”
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