One imagines it would be excellent to be friends with Luka Modric. You can tell from the way he plays football that he’s the kind of guy who would give you a lift to the airport, or listen attentively to your relationship troubles, or be an extremely reliable candidate to feed your cat while you’re on holiday.

But the way a man plays football can be deceiving, because it turns out Luka Modric is a terrible friend. He cannot be trusted, and Gareth Bale has just found this out to his cost.

According to the Express, the Welshman has revealed to Luka – his old Tottenham teammate and bestest Bernabeu buddy – that he wants to quit Real Madrid and move to Manchester United.

He reportedly delivered the bombshell in a private Whatsapp conversation between the pals – the contents of which have somehow made it onto the front page of Spanish rumour rag Don Balon.

This can mean one of two things. Either that snake Modric has been showing Bale’s Whatsapp messages to people to make himself look like some kind of big shot, or Don Balon have made the entire thing up because, at the end of the day, who’s going to stop them?

Either way, it’s thoroughly unpleasant. So let’s move on to something more wholesome, such as Danny Drinkwater.

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Duo to be reunited at Chelsea

He’s the kind of salt of the earth, solid geezer who would never share your Whatsapps, never let you down, never abandon you, right?

Err, well actually no. Because abandonment is exactly what he’s apparently planning to inflict on Leicester City.

The Mirror says the midfielder is set to slap in a transfer request in order to force through a move to Chelsea and complete a blissful reunion with his former Foxes partner in crime N’Golo Kante. Which is rather sweet actually, so at least we get a romantic ending in that one.

Chelsea have also made a move for Paris Saint-Germain right-back Serge Aurier, says the Sun. The Ivorian is a target for Manchester United too, with neither club seemingly remotely concerned that Aurier is not currently allowed to enter the UK due to his recent conviction for assaulting a police officer.

Neymar-less Barcelona are set to kick off the mother of all spending sprees with a £90m move for Borussia Dortmund forward Ousmane Dembele, says the Mail. So it’s a good moment to have a little chuckle at the fact that Tottenham passed up the chance to sign the young Frenchman for £1m a couple of years ago.

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Elsewhere, Spurs (and Liverpool) have received a boost in their pursuit of Geoffrey Kondogbia after the midfielder asked to leave Inter Milan (Talksport), West Brom are interested in Leicester’s attacking flop Ahmed Musa (Mirror) and PSG are poised to gazump Arsenal for Jean Michael Seri by meeting the Nice midfielder’s £36m release clause (Metro). Those guys will pay literally any release clause, irrespective of the amount of money required to trigger it.

@darlingkevin