Manchester United Transfer News: Khedira, Kroos, Song And Gundogan Linked In Latest Rumors

Fresh from signing Wayne Rooney to a massive new contract, Manchester United are reportedly eagerly making plans to splash more cash in the summer to ensure that there is no repeat of what has been a torrid first season under David Moyes.

Unsurprisingly, it is in midfield where Moyes’s focus is believed to lie. The Daily Mirror has reported that United are prepared to offer Bayern Munich midfielder Toni Kroos a contract not far short of Rooney’s in order to tempt him to Old Trafford. The Germany international’s deal at Bayern is set to expire in the summer of 2015 and United are said to be offering him £250,000 a week.

It seems hard to believe that a Bayern would allow a talent like Kroos to depart and equally unlikely that the 24-year-old would want to leave the all-conquering European champions. Yet the longer the holdout goes on, the more it becomes a realistic proposition. While coach Pep Guardiola and sporting director Matthias Sammer have both said recently that they want Kroos to say, Bayern’s honorary president, Franz Beckenbauer, has given the player a warning over his contract demands.

"He shouldn't raise the stakes too high,” Beckenbauer told Sky Germany. "Bayern will make an effort to keep him, but when the demands are too high, a decision will be made. There is no player who you have to give everything to keep. Everyone is replaceable.”

Kroos is not the only Germany international midfielder that Manchester United are thought to be keenly pursuing. Indeed, the Sunday People has claimed that the Premier League champions are confident that they have won the battle to sign Borussia Dortmund’s Ilkay Gundogan. The 23-year-old excelled as Dortmund reached the Champions League final last season but has not featured since the opening match of this campaign due to injury. Real Madrid and Barcelona have both been linked to Gundogan in recent times, but it is said that Moyes believes that he has secured his signature in a deal that could be worth as much as £32 million.

Completing the German midfielder theme, Talksport has asserted that United’s interest will be sparked by Real Madrid supposedly making Sami Khedira available this summer. United are thought to have made a late bid for the defensive-minded midfielder late in last summer’s transfer window. Khedira, 26, is currently out with a serious knee injury picked up on in international duty last November.

Meanwhile, a report in Spanish daily Sport has claimed that United have their eyes on another tenacious midfielder in Barcelona’s Alex Song. It is said that the former Arsenal man was on United’s radar both last summer and in January, but that the player wanted to try and prove himself at the Camp Nou. Yet, as he still struggles for minutes on the pitch, it is suggested that he could be open to a move to Old Trafford come the end of the season.

Used primarily as a center-back during his first season at Barcelona, Song has been used in his natural position by new coach Tata Martino. Still he has only started 10 games in the league and Champions League combined and his most recent start, on Sunday, saw him score an own goal in a 3-1 defeat to Real Sociedad.

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