Amazing story coming out of Moncao yesterday if it's true Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich actually officiated Didier Drogba's wedding. The Russian billionaire married Drogba and his long time partner Lalla Diakite while Sol Kalou and Florent Malouda served as ... Continue reading →

Newly appointed Chelsea manager Andre Villas-Boas arrives at Stamford Bridge from FC Porto with very little managerial experience, but a growing reputation that usurps even the most accomplished of European coaches. Awaiting the young Portuguese tactician, the toughest job in football – not the act of managing Chelsea Football Club, but the unenviable task of satisfying Roman Abramovich's ambition.

The phone first rang a year ago in January. The caller identified himself as Bob Rich, a billionaire American businessman and sports team owner. He had English royals among his ancestors. For Christmas, his wife had bought him the title Lord of Bedlington. And he wanted to do something, well, lordly.

There is some surprising breaking news today that Newcastle owner Mike Ashley has accepted a bid from a Russian Billionaire, to sell the club he has owned since June of 2007. Alexei Mordashov 45 year-old Russian Billionaire buys Newcastle club This is a surprise, but apparently the Russian Billionaire Alexei Mordashov contacted Mike Ashley [.

Probable contenders for Villa Park hotseat - originally posted on Soccerlens.com

Gerard Houllier's mutual departure from Aston Villa last week has left us all guessing as to who will take over the reins at Villa Park. Normally we would have a fair idea as to who that will be, but at the moment it is anyone's guess who will be implemented by Chairman Randy Lerner.

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Matt Scot/The Digger - The Guardian re Amit Bhatia Possible Renewed Bid for QPR or Interest in Millwall
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Football needs to be careful. We all love the drama of a good transfer deadline day and that feeling when your club lands a great player is brilliant but the whole situation is becoming scary.

As I sit and write this, Fernando Torres is moving for nearly £50 million and Andy Carroll is the subject of a bid of nearly £40million.

Written by Gooner in Exile

Ok, the day some of us (me included) dreaded has finally arrived. The ownership of our beloved club has moved into a single pair of hands, some of us have said not over our dead bodies, some of us have asked for it to be done the Arsenal way, some of us said its ok if its a billionaire to come and buy us trophies.

As a lifelong football fan who has watched the sport at almost every level of the game for the last 40+ years, I have developed some dyed in the wool attitudes about many things, not least of which is my utter contempt for the vast majority of the people who run our sport, from the owners and directors of the clubs to the crooks and clowns who administrate our game.

Burned over Beckham: The Galaxy's penchant for not fully disclosing injuries finally caught up with them and David Beckham, seen here holding the Olympic torch earlier this month with Lord Sebastian Coe, ahead of the 2012 London Olympics (AP Photo).

Specifically, David Beckham's unreported back spasms that kept him out of last weekend's game against the Colorado rapids.

Alan Pardew tried today to dismiss all the takeover rumors surrounding the club, and whether it would be sold soon some some Billionaire - somewhere. Mike Ashley what does this man want to do with Newcastle? Of course Alan's job is to concentrate only on the last 9 games of the season, and job [.

The inevitable is finally happening – a billionaire is buying Arsenal. Will it make Arsenal a rich man's play thing? Will there be money available to the manager? Will Wenger have a sword hanging over his head? Will the Gunners be laden with the burden of debt? Will Usmanov sell his stake? What about the AST, Fanshare, and other minority shareholders?

It finally happened. Stan Kroenke, the American billionaire with a horde of sports teams already to his name (the Denver Nuggets, Colorado Rapids, etc.), finally pulled the trigger and bought enough shares to make a ...

Will an American billionaire change the culture of England's most glamorous soccer club?

When Roman Abramovich turned up in West London in 2003 to buy Chelsea, the Blues' fan were rubbing their hands together at the prospect of the Russian billionaire transforming their under-achieving club into a major European force. Despite bringing relative success on the pitch Abramovich also brings an emphatic state of uncertainty and instability, particularly to the man in the dugout.

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- West Ham at Risk of Football Oblivion
- Football League: Stay OFF The Field
- Chris Charles Weekly Blog (With Usual QPR portion)
- French Racial Quotas Investigated
- Rushden & Diamonds Deducted Ten Points
- QPR Report: A Watford Perspective
Daily Mail
Ecclestone: 'I won't be watching if my QPR team clinch promotion at Watford'
By Jonathan McEvoy 30th April 2011
Bernie Ecclestone will not be found celebrating with his Queens Park Rangers players if they win promotion to the Barclays Premier League today.

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- Any American or Canadian Readers of QPR Report/QPR Report Messageboard?

I suspect the main reason is I have to develop my "tribal" following of a Football Franchise placed on the Gold Coast by a Billionaire without any organic growth. I had to get into it straight away with a bunch of people I had never met. These people are great and I will gladly go to the games with them, but there is definitely something missing in my Football experience here on the Gold Coast.

The Russian billionaire Elisha Usmanov has made it clear that if he had a controlling interest in the Arsenal board, then he would be spending money on the first-team, not just for the sake of it but as a way of making more money in the future. He has slammed the current board for just [...]

Andrey Arshavin has ruled out moves to Real Madrid and Anzhi Makhachkala and pledged his future to Arsenal.

The 30-year-old failed to display his best form for Arsenal last season and has just one year remaining on his present deal.

He has held talks with the Gunners board over a 12-month extension but as yet, a deal has not been concluded.

Hamburg rejects Juve bid for Dutch winger
After signing striker Mirko Vucinic last week, Juventus has turned its attention towards filling the hole the team has on the left wing. Over the last few days the focus of their search centered on Hamburg's Eljero Elia and a deal was reportedly close to going through.

Frequenzton Hoffenheim by borussentv

Well, according to a statement released on the club's website, a Hoffenheim employee did on his own accord.

The high publicity and pro/con arguments surrounding billionaire backed village team Hoffenheim have died down for a while now, just as Hoffenheim themselves settled down as yet another mid table team.

Cameroon striker Samuel Eto'o has signed a world record breaking £345,000 per week deal at Russian club Anzhi Makhachkala. The former Inter Milan striker was signed by the Russian side this week in a £22 million transfer, but his wages alone will set them back much more.

According to The Sun, Eto'o's pay packet leaves him earning £345,000 per week after taxes, which is a staggering amount for a 30 year old, and makes him the highest earning footballer in the world.

FC Anzhi Makhachkala (Russian: ФК "Анжи" Махачкала) is a Russian soccer club based in Makhachkala, the capital of the Republic of Dagestan. The club currently plays in the Russian Premier League and is currently in 5th place in the table. Owned by billionaire Suleyman Kerimov, FC Anzhi Makhachkala has been in the news lately for [.

Jose Mourinho has turned down an offer from Russian side Anzhi Makhachkala that reportedly would have paid him the the biggest salary in the history of football.

Spanish newspaper Marca claims Mourinho turned down an astonishing £22 million-a-year AFTER tax to take the helm at the Black Sea club.

Russian big spenders Anzhi Makhachkala are lining up swoops for Robin van Persie, Nicolas Anelka and Neymar, according to player-coach Roberto Carlos.

Carlos claimed his club are also targeting Paris St Germain star Nene in a bid to eventually become as big as Real Madrid and Barcelona.

Playing the long game: Andre Villas Boas and Chelsea is a post from: Just Football

by Andreas Vou

Manchester United are the benchmark to every football club aiming for long term success. The Red Devils stuck with Sir Alex Ferguson despite winning nothing in his first four years in charge and have fully reaped the rewards, having overtaken Liverpool's record 18 domestic league titles last year and winning two Champions League titles in the Scot's ongoing 25 year reign.

By Alan Duffy

Peter Hill-Wood, Stan Kroenke and Stan Kroenke's hair take their seats at the Emirates

Silent Stan Kroenke finally spoke to Arsenal's shareholders at the club's annual AGM in London today. The US billionaire said: "(Arsenal) has tremendous management at the top, a wonderful manager on the pitch who makes great decisions in regard to personnel, and a tremendous following with the supporters.

Taarabt's Too Good For You
Queens Park Rangers 2-1 Coventry (23:01:10)
The plan here was to pen an article about QPR without solely concentrating on their billionaire owners and that helipad that comes out of the centre circle on non-matchdays.

Upon announcing losses of £25.5million – underwritten by owner Ellis Short – Sunderland chairman Niall Quinn has gone on the offensive with regard to fans who watch his club's games in the pub or on internet streams at home.
Quinn is concerned about falling attendances this season, despite the club hovering in and around the top six.

The main news in the Sunday papers today is that Newcastle United are said to be on the verge of a takeover involving an Indian Billionaire. Anil Ambanai - head of the Reliance ADA group It's the Daily Mirror that is reporting that officials representing an Indian Billionaire have already visited the Newcastle club and [.

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- On This Day in Football: March 13.

Newcastle Chief Scout Graham Carr is getting some well earned praise for some of the players he has brought into the club recently. Mike Ashley passionate owner of Newcastle really? And with the news today that an Indian Billionaire may be wanting to buy the Newcastle club, Graham has come out and done [.

One thing the Newcastle club is getting better at is that whenever there's a daft report in the papers, especially on Sundays, they immediately deny it. Mike Ashley and MD Derek Llambias And the Sunday Mirror reported today that they knew that an Indian Billionaire, who remained anonymous, was in advanced talks about acquiring Newcastle [.

New York - MLS has toiled in American obscurity for nearly twenty years. For the last ten, it's lost staggering mindshare to the billionaire train-sets of Europe that use August financial outlays to determine May trophy allocations. As American soccer fans rail against unsustainable Federal spending in their political lives, they gravitate to the TARP-ian business models of the Glazers, Lerners, and Abramovichs like a Paulson to a broker bail-out.

So Everton 2 - 1 Man City and our hoodoo over the billionaire mercenaries continues...Extremely gratifying given it was Lescott's first return to Goodison.
Also gratifying given how much I detest the faux-zany superfan-wannabe scoring celebration that is "The Poznan". Honestly, what is that all about?

Today's 'It's Only A Game' is brought to you in a slightly tired and distorted fashion. Rather than this being a result of celebrating the Nations Cup, I merely decided to enjoy the fruits of my labour (ahem) – but needless to say, I still managed to glean this morning and yesterday's top stories, starting with.

In the ever impulsive world we live in where patience is the court jester,taking the long view is almost a revolutionary act. Super Billionaire Roman Abramovich Chelsea owner must in an act of pure defiance against his own personality and character hold on to Carlo Ancelotti and remind himself that Carlo did not forget how to manage.

The cash-rich Anzhi Makhachkala are reportedly close to sealing a deal for the Chelsea left-winger Yuri Zhirkov, who has become disillusioned with life at Stamford Bridge after failing to hold down a regular place in the team. The Russian billionaire Suleyman Kerimov is aiming to make Anzhi into the biggest club in Russia and Zhirkov [.

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For additional details, see Bushman's QPR History
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- Throughout the day, the QPR Report Messageboard has news updates, comments and perspectives - even links to other board comments of interest re QPR matters (on and off the field) along with football (and ONLY football) topics in general.