Bayern general manager plays down Blues’ bid for Frenchman
Earlier this week, the nation’s favourite tabloid claimed that Roman Abramovich would personally fly to Germany to thrash out a £40m deal for Real Madrid target Franck Ribery.
For that kind of money, the Blues would probably expect all of the Frenchman’s body parts, but Bayern Munich general manager Uli Hoeness has insisted that this isn’t the case:
“What does he expect for [£40m] - Ribery’s right leg? Seriously, we stopped talking about Franck leaving a month ago because it isn’t going to happen.”
Once again, Bayern are adamant that they will not relinquish their grip on the Bundesliga’s biggest star, even though he has personally expressed his desire to play for Madrid.
Ribery was not fit for the start of the Bundesliga season, but Bayern coach Louis van Gaal allowed him to train with the France team this week as a means of improving his recent grumpy attitude. Despite the Dutchman’s claims that he would not be fit to face the Faroe Islands last night, he did play in the second half.
As we sit on the cusp of another Premier League season, the folks at Google have released figures of all their football related searches from the past month. The team above represents the most-searched for Premier League stars on the web based on their positions.
As you can see, most of them have been involved in transfer deals or speculation. David James’ relatively-surprising spot in the side is probably helped by his occasional newspaper columns, and Steven Gerrard can attribute his first team place to his impossibly persuasive legal team.
The most searched team was Liverpool with 16 million hits, then followed Chelsea (13m), Arsenal (9.1m) and Manchester Utd (9m). Bolton were the least searched for side with 250,000 hits.
Chelsea have been searching all summer for what they call a “marquee name” expect them to bring three in at once by spending £100 million on Pirlo, Ribery and Aguero.
The sonic truth-o-meter: The Blues have been linked with Pirlo ever since Carlo Ancelotti’s appointment and that looks a reasonable possibility but Bayern Munich have said Ribery is no longer available and Aguero is supposedly happy to stay in Spain.
Joe Cole to Spurs Obviously the arrival of two more midfielders would damage Cole’s chances of getting into Chelsea’s first team when he returns from injury. .
The sonic truth-o-meter: It’s no secret that Harry Redknapp rates Joe Cole very highly but the winger is one of the Blues’ most popular players so they might not be willing to sell.
The sonic truth-o-meter: There probably won’t be too much trouble getting Chamakh to agree to a move but Arsenal will need to up their current offer of £5 million in order for a deal to be completed