Are Spurs and United battling for rights to Leicester winger?

Welcome to Dispatches from Bat Country, where we here at Cartilage Free Captain take all the craziest, outlandish rumors that someone like Tancredi Palmeri blurts out, yells "SUPERBOOM!", and hopes something sticks.

Everyone, we haven't even hit the January window and I'm already tired of this. Imagine what we'll all be like on deadline day and absolutely nothing has happened other than depth signings?

Today's #BatCountry fun starts off over at Bleacher Report (thanks to user Man's Best Freund, who linked this in the Hoddle today) where a report comes in by "featured columnist" Tom Sunderland, stating that Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester United have both made the incredibly specific bid of £29.9m.

Manchester United have reportedly made a concrete offer for the services of Leicester City attacker Riyad Mahrez, but Premier League rivals Tottenham Hotspur have matched the bid.

The report makes it quick to point out that it's coming from ESPNFC per Tom Doyle, who actually doesn't have that bad of a track record when it comes to transfer rumors. His report is a little more specific.

Le 10 Sport quotes French TV programme "Telefoot" as reporting that both Manchester United and Tottenham have offered the Foxes €41 million (£29.9m) for the 24-year-old midfielder -- big money considering Leicester's meteoric rise this season, but perhaps not big enough to tempt club officials considering the sheer amount of cash that will soon flood the Premier League from the new British TV rights deal coming in 2016.

But all is not lost, Leicester fans -- Mahrez himself has said it would be foolish to leave at this point in time with a potential title challenge lying ahead, Mirror: "It is good to have clubs that are interested in you but I feel very good at Leicester and it would be stupid to leave in January, especially because we are in first position!"

Doyle's report is coming from Le 10 Sport in France, who certainly have their own write-up.

Les prestations de Riyad Mahrez sous les couleurs de Leicester, ont tout naturellement attiré l’attention des plus grands clubs de Premier League. D’après les informations de Téléfoot, Manchester United et Tottenham auraient offerts pas moins de 41M€ pour l’international algérien, auteur de 14 buts en 18 matches cette saison. S’ils décidaient de le vendre, les Foxes feraient une énorme pluvalue pour le joueur acquis au Havre. L’Algérien avait été acquis pour près de 500 000€ au Havre, à l’hiver 2014, soit 82 fois moins cher que le prix auquel il pourrait quitter le King Power Stadium.

Plugging this into the Google machine reveals that the specific bid is actually for €41m, so the exchange rate is what's causing the £29.9m amount.

Mentioned in both the ESPNFC report and the Le 10 Sport report is that they are quoting a TV program by the name of Telefoot. There are no quotes actually stating that a specific member of either club has come out and said that they've formally made a bid or even shown interest in the Algerian winger. Whether or not there are specifics from that program is unclear, simply because the reports have failed to bring that part up. We have to assume it's just someone quoting the dreaded unnamed sources, but you can also see that there are actual quotes from Mahrez himself, stating that he likes the attention but he's happy at Leicester.

Also, there's this from his agent:

Kamel Bengougam, Riyad Mahrez's agent, says Mahrez wants to say with Leicester for the rest of the season and no clubs have contacted him

— Amy Lewis (@AmyLewisSport) December 21, 2015

This is the only part that makes sense. Mahrez signed a new deal in August through the 2018-2019 season. He probably got a nice raise and Leicester got some protection in the transfer market because they knew teams were going to come calling for him. While that £30m doesn't seem that outlandish of a bid for a player as hot as he is, one could say that even higher bids will be made in the Summer.

To wrap this up, this was an article by Bleacher Report, quoting ESPNFC, who were quoting Le 10 Sport, who were quoting Telefoot, all while both the player and his agent are saying he's happy at Leicester.

Johnny Depp, sum it up for us please.