Yodelling portal, Yahoo!, has distanced itself from speculation that it is to splash out £40 million to sponsor the shirts of the world's biggest football club, Manchester United. A report on Friday claimed that as part of the deal, Man Utd would use Yahoo! to help market its merchandise on the Internet to its global grandstand of fans and supporters. Iliane Vanees, head of marketing at Yahoo! in Britain, said: "The story is just rumour and speculation." Speculation that online bookseller, Amazon, was on a shortlist of companies eager to win the lucrative sponsorship deal were also dashed. A spokesman for Amazon.co.uk said that any involvement with Man Utd was "pure speculation". If it goes ahead, the deal would be the biggest in British football and would replace Man Utd's previous shirt sponsor, Sharp, which runs out later this year. No one from Man Utd was available for comment. Elsewhere, a report in today's Metro claims Yahoo! is set to pay £15 million to sponsor the Prost F1 motor racing team. ®