By Tim Stannard

1) Rooney linked with winter move to join LA Galaxy stars

Now let me welcome everybody to the wild, wild west. A state that's untouchable like Elliot Ness.

There could be a new player in the City of Angels with Wayne Rooney potentially just weeks away from walking off a fancy private plane in slow motion and taking off his sunglasses in the studied manner of the ginger bloke from one of the CSI shows. 

According to the British press – so it must be true - the Manchester United man is in the plans of LA Galaxy to take over the aging Liverpudlian role soon to be vacated by Steven Gerrard who is looking to return to England.

If the California club are not put off by the forward's extraordinary wages at Manchester United where the footballer appears to be quite unwanted by Jose Mourinho, then parity could be restored to the brutal and divisive West Coast - East Coast veteran MLS rivalry which is currently dominated by the Villa, Pirlo, Lampard, Wright-Phillips posse in the Big Apple. 

2) Coach Zizou calls for calm on Ronaldo crisis

There is a blast of hot air swooping out of a damp Spain as the Big Two of La Liga are in action on Saturday, which means that the Big Two bosses have been talking.

Luis Enrique has been commenting on what he refers to as “circus” topics – anything non-football related – and an institutional battle between Barcelona and the Spanish League over what they feel is unfair treatment from the Valencia dust-up last weekend. “Everyone has had their say. I’m focused on the three points we need against Granada,” said the Barca boss slamming the door shut.

The topic of conversation for Coach Zizou was, as ever, Cristiano Ronaldo, and his goal drought. "Cristiano has set such a high bar that whenever he is a little off form, everyone thinks there is a problem,” declared the Frenchman who was then asked for the 89th time, who should win the Ballon d’Or. The response was fairly predictable. Nacho. Not really. Tune into the Locker Room at 7:30PM ET / 4:30PM PT for a full preview of the weekend in La Liga.

3) Inter give backing to under pressure De Boer

Inter Milan have held a Council of the Wise over the future of Frank de Boer. And the verdict on Friday is that the Dutchman’s job is safe despite winning just four Serie A matches from 10 this season. “He accepted to come here at the last minute and it's not an easy situation. We're 100 percent behind him,'' declared Inter’s CEO CEO Michael Bolingbroke.

Tune into the XTRA on Friday at 7PM ET / 4PM PT to get a full breakdown of the weekend’s big clashes in Serie A including a Juventus v Napoli epic encounter.

4) PSG figurative frogs need leap from Lille-pad to get season started

The official football weekend gets underway in Europe when beIN SPORTS says so. And that’s 2:40PM ET /11:40AM PT over in France with a still very flat PSG trying to get a spring in their step away at Lille. That match is live on beIN SPORTS.

Over on Connect and we have a fine Championship offering of QPR taking on Brentford and in La Liga Leganes are looking for a first win in their home in La Primera against Real Sociedad. Catch all the highlights of that and a ‘German Team’ on the XTRA.

5) Final Four comes together in WTA finals

The final four of the WTA finals is now shaping up with the group states completing on Friday. Svetlana Kuznetsova will play Dominika Cibulkova in one semifinals with world number one, Angelique Kerber, taking on Agnieszka Radwanska who has just defeated Karolina Pliskova.

WHAT IS SPORTS BURST?

The life philosophy of Sports Burst is that if you are not upsetting someone, then you are not trying hard enough. SB is a daily trawl and troll through the morning's sports news to bring you fact-nuggets to make you both smile and swear. Hopefully at the same time.