SPANISH FOOTBALL & SPORTS daily newspaper "AS" publish that the arrival of BENFICA & Portuguese International FABIO COENTRAO is an almost done deal. The paper goes on to inform that REAL MADRID is waiting to transfer French midfielder LASS DIARRA & then with the money gained do the operation with Benfica for their player.

We've looked through the record of players Newcastle are said to be interested in this summer, and we've come up with 4 players who would cost Newcastle around £30M in transfer fees, but they would improve the squad immensely. Here they are with a short piece on each player. GERVINHO Age: 23 Position: Winger/Striker Club: [.

So exactly what should Arsenal look like at the start of 2011/2012 season? by Abdul First of all selling Chamakh (£13m) Squillaci (£5m) Denilson (£8m), Bendtner (£10M), Eboue (£8m) and Almunia (£5m) would see the team generate roughly £50m. The board, in particular new owner Stan Kroenke I would hope, should give Wenger another £30m [.

Another Saturday comes around and the usual suspects are still being linked with Arsenal.

Ricardo Alvarez, yes the player were supposed to have signed on a free transfer, who then become subject to a tug of war between Arsenal and Manchester United, is back in the frame or perhaps not.

Wigan and former Newcastle left winger Charles N'Zogbia has one year left on his contract, and could leave next summer for nothing. as a free agent. Charles N'Zogbia £20 or £30M for this player? So would you think Wigan Chairman and owner, Dave Whelan, who initially slapped a fee of £9M on the player, [.

Last night news broke that Chelsea will be willing to listen for offers of around £20m for Fernando Torres in January as long as someone can match his reported £150K per week wages. The story continued that Chelsea had already put the feelers out around Europe amongst the elite to see if anyone wanted to take him.

Newcastle United striker Andy Carroll has been sold to Liverpool for a fee in excess of £30m. After resisting a number of offers to sell the striker who was apparently not for sale, it seems that Andy Carroll eventually handed in a transfer request, forcing the club to reluctantly accept Liverpool's offer.

Tottenham manager Harry Redknapp has confirmed that Spurs made a club-record bid of £35m for Giuseppe Rossi on Monday. That bid was turned down, but Spurs expects to be back in the summer to try again.

Redknapp said:

"Daniel (Spurs club chairman Daniel Levy) always said that if we found the right player then we would have gone for him but it was difficult.

We reported yesterday that Newcastle were linked with Uruguayan striker Edinson Cavani. Edinson Cavani - while at Palermo And you would notice that we didn't quote any transfer fee for the player in that article, but in later reports he's being valued at anywhere between £30M and £35M, although that seems a bit high for [.

Morning all,

some interesting quotes from Arsene have emerged from a radio interview he did in France. They've been carried via the Twitter account of the President of the Arsenal supporters club France. And if yesterday's performance by Mr Blatter has taught us anything it's that Presidents are men of honour and quiet dignity who are to be trusted implicitly.

The newspapers were always going to produce stories linking Dimitar Berbatov with a move back to Spurs after the Bulgarian was left out of Manchester United's squad on Saturday for the Champions League final with Barcelona.

One can only imagine his reaction at the news that he wasn't even worthy of a place on the bench, but it's possible that the player could see it as a final insult, after a period out of the team cost him a chance of winning the Golden Boot outright.

Another transfer window means will Cesc go or will he stay. This is become repetitive and tedious. Many Arsenal fans are sick and tired of the annual Barcelona attempt to poach our captain for nothing!

Last summer was the summer we all thought Cesc would leave, he even asked to leave and told Arsene to his face he wanted to leave, or so the stories go.

Wigan chairman Dave Whelan has told interested clubs that they'll have to pay upwards of £20 million if they want Charles N'Zogbia. Liverpool and Aston Villa are the front-runners in the race for the Frenchman, but so far have failed to meet Wigan's valuation of the player.

"I see some of the players being sold for £20m-£30m and Zoggy is better than them," Whelan said.

In a list dominated by NFL teams in which all 32 find a spot in the top 50 sports franchises, the pride of place goes to Man Utd with a valuation of $1.86 billion.

Utd is a branding behemoth and their AON shirt sponsorship is worth $32m over four years. Next year their Nike shoe merchandise will be renewed for $70m, an increase of $30m over their existing contract to expire in 2015.

The Mirror has today reported that Inter Milan have accepted a bid in excess of £30m for Wesley Sneijder.

They have also claimed that PSG are prepared to pay £18m for Dimitar Berbatov.

"Sneijder Bid Accepted? Berba To PSG?" was originally published at The Republik of Mancunia.

The agent of Porto full-back Alvaro Pereira has refused to rule out a summer move for the Uruguayan but admits any interested clubs will have to pay his full €30 million release clause.
The 25-year-old has been linked with a move to Premier League giants Liverpool and Chelsea, as well as mega-rich French side PSG and his agent Alejandro Savich believes a move could happen.

El Mundo Deportivo reports that midfielder Mesut Ozil has grown increasingly unhappy at Real Madrid and is seeking a way out of the Santiago Bernabéu at the end of the season.

According to the newspaper, Inter Milan have already been in contact and have asked to be kept informed of any developments concerning the German international, although Madrid President, Florentino Pérez, will attempt to get the player to reconsider his position.

By Ollie Irish

Edin Dzeko: Desirable to all

The Guardian's Barney Ronay captured best the ubiquity of Edin Dzeko, in a superb piece about the January transfer window:

"The player who is suddenly everywhere will, once again, be everywhere.

Manchester City have reached an agreement to sign Bosnian striker Edin Dzeko from Wolfsburg according to City manager Roberto Manciniin a deal worth around £30m. For that, City get a young (24) striker who has scored 66 goals in 111 games for Wolfsburg.

"We have an important game at Arsenal coming up and I will speak about him after that," said Mancini.

Manchester City have reached an agreement to sign Bosnian striker Edin Dzeko from Wolfsburg according to City manager Roberto Manciniin a deal worth around £30m. For that, City get a young (24) striker who has scored 66 goals in 111 games for Wolfsburg.

"We have an important game at Arsenal coming up and I will speak about him after that," said Mancini.

Today's pre-match is difficult to write following RockyLives' fine and controversial post on Monday. In his post he covered many of the subjects I would have chosen to write about, in particular, the changing face of Man City.

I have been swayed by some of the articulate arguments raised by the City fans who came onto the site and expressed themselves so eloquently perhaps they are not just a rich man's foible.

Chelsea legend Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink has urged Chelsea to spend as soon as possible and sign Sergio Aguero. Hasselbaink sees the Argentinian front man as an ideal signing that would help save our season and he is quoted in the STAR here by saying:

"This boy is on fire right now.

Manchester City's new £30m striker Edin Dzeko has already endeared himself with City fans after digging at neighbours United claiming most Manchester fans are City fans. But who will have the last laugh come May I wonder!

Yesterday I spent much of the afternoon checking and double checking some information I received regarding Eden Hazard and the state of his reported transfer to Arsenal in the summer.

Using a mixture of sources (including information from private discussions with journalists), I am 100% certain the following information is correct.

According to a report in Voetbal International, Ajax are far from happy with Liverpool's attempts to lure Luis Suarez away and are ready to file a complaint to Fifa against the Reds for illegally approaching the player.
Liverpool supposedly contacted Suarez's agent Pere Guardiola in the first week of January, but didn't inform Ajax about their interest until January 14.

Only at Liverpool could a day where a fee for Luis Suarez is agreed first be dominated by news of Fernando Torres' possible exit. The last remnant of the Hicks and Gillett era is the perpetual expectation that only bad things are going to happen. It's going to take more than a few months where we've seen the return of the King and slightly improved results to wash away the preeminent feeling of paranoia.

There have been a number of contributions to Manchester United's currently unbeaten Premier League campaign but who has been your player of the season so far?Perhaps its Dimitar Berbatov who has started to justify the £30m paid for him by becoming the league's leading goalscorer or maybe its Ryan Giggs who, despite turning 37 years of age in November, is still as crucial a player now as he ever

Dimitar Berbatov is 30 today. Once upon a time that age seemed to spell decline or the closing of a career. In this day and age, with players looking after themselves the way they do, that doesn't have to be the case.

Berbatov joined United in what was meant to be his prime as a 27-year-old, which is why we forked out a massive £30m for him.

Tottenham manager Harry Redknapp has confirmed that Spurs made a club-record bid of £35m for Giuseppe Rossi on Monday. That bid was turned down, but Spurs expects to be back in the summer to try again.

Redknapp said:

"Daniel (Spurs club chairman Daniel Levy) always said that if we found the right player then we would have gone for him but it was difficult.

Like students remembering about their coursework, Prem clubs left everything to the last minute and then rushed around doing all that they could, wise or not.

Liverpool were short on time and in the money with Torres' impending move, hence the swollen fee for Andy Carroll. Any regulars to these reports (there probably aren't any) will know how much I love Carroll, but even I baulked.

It was the biggest story of January's transfer window with enough columns being filled about Torres' proposed move to Chelsea to compete with the Colosseum in Rome. Rumours started circulating in the summer and a deal was on the cards a long way off, even before Torres himself came out and informed the Liverpool owners he wanted to move on.

Newcastle seemed to strike a good deal for Andy Carroll, and not only did they bank an immediate £30M in cash, but also will get 25% of any Carroll transfer sell-on in the future. Mike Ashley club will get 25% of next Andy Carroll transfer fee That's in excess of the £35M This means [...]

It seems that Newcastle United boss Alan Pardew will have plenty of money to spend in the summer, with Newcastle having received £35M from the sale of Andy Carroll in January to Liverpool. Alan Pardew - wants to increase competition for places at club And £30M of that was paid in cold cash, which will [.

The Newcastle manager Alan Pardew has been interviewed by BBC Newcastle today, and he has said that he is absolutely 100% confident, the Carroll Cash will be reinvested into the Newcastle club. Mike Ashley will reinvest all of Carroll cash Newcastle have £35M available from the Carroll transfer, and £30M of that is in [.

I was not present at the weekly Wenger press conference yesterday morning in the media room at the Emirates - but with so many websites posting up the video of it, I did not need to be.

The noise from the pond life scum, otherwise known as the British Press, this weekend will no doubt be a negative one towards our transfer policy, based purely on the fact Wenger stated he believes in his current crop of players.

Benfica president Luis Filipe Vieira insists Fabio Coentrao would only be allowed to leave for €30million (£26m).
The attack-minded Portugal left-back has been linked with a summer move to Real Madrid, Manchester City, AC Milan,Liverpool and Bayern Munich.
But Benfica are unwilling to allow Coentrao to leave for anything less than £26million.

Morning all, happy Friday. First let's get this Puyol/Pique, picture of Cesc thing out of the way.

Crude I know but it does the job. Plus I didn't have time to 'shop in Cristiano Ronaldo taking a romantic walk with Shakira. Some may put it down to high-jinks, a pair of footballers having a bit of a laugh, but given the way Arsenal have helped Barcelona this week, opening our training ground and facilities to them, it showed a distinct lack of respect.

Manchester City moved closer to securing the signature of highly-rated Udinese-winger Alexis Sanchez for £30million after City officials were in Italy last night seeking to thrash out a deal.

Manchester City coach Roberto Mancini has pinpointed the flying winger-come-forward as his number one transfer target this summer with the Citizens ready to compete on three fronts next term.

André Villas-Boas is the stealthy one.

His snow job on the media took him off the short list of candidates which then concentrated on Guus Hiddink's reported arrival. Everyone believed Villas-Boas would stay on in Porto for at least another season. There were articles devoted to why he would do so as Boas dampened expectations citing astronomical release amounts.

You know those people who, some time in March, get a little newspaper piece about them? The ones who live somewhere by the sea, or up a mountain, and say they can predict the long-term weather because of the amount of moss on the trees or the number of donkeys that are born that year or by the amount of pus that oozes from their canker sores?