It appears that the hunter is about to become the hunted. Chelsea might be throwing their weight around in the transfer market, making cheeky enquiries about the likes of Franck Ribery and Fernando Torres, only to be amazingly rebuffed by the clubs in question. However, it appears that the Blues squad may now be shorn of some quality, if Jose Mourinho’s Internazionale get their way.

The Guardian report that the Italian champions have now gone on record to confirm that they want to sign Frank Lampard more than anything in the whole wide world. There is little doubt that this interest has been brought about by installing his former Chelsea manager in charge at the club, although will they be able to wrest him from Stamford Bridge?

Mourinho is keen on adding the midfielder, who turns 30 next week, to his ranks at the Nerazzurri for a fee of about £8m. “Everybody considers Lampard a great player, but this doesn’t mean that signing him will be easy,” said Massimo Moratti. “We like him, though, and he’s our No1 priority. Mourinho likes Lampard a lot. We all know that he can be a great player with us.”

There is surely doubt that Lamps’ departure would be a big blow to Chelsea, although perhaps Scolari doesn’t rate him that highly and believes he can replace him with someone better (Deco for instance). It must be weird for the future Chelsea manager to see all this talk going on while he’s trying to concentrate on Euro 2008, how can he be in two places at once though!