By Alan Duffy
In the past 12 months or so, the global nature of football has become all the more apparent, as
the UAE, India and China have suddenly become legitimate destinations for some of the game's bigger
(and mostly older) stars.
By Chris Wright
HR 4 RF IDST
As we've gradually found out over the past week-and-a-half, Tottenham manager Harry Redknapp
takes his tax advice from a magical hobgoblin that lives in his biscuit tin. What we also now know
is that, instead of his labrynthine scouting network at Spurs, he seems to rely on Manchester
United's Rio Ferdinand when it comes to the final word on his signings.
By Chris Wright
Anyone who has ever watched Sky Sports News on either August 31st or January 30th will already
be well acquainted with Jim White; the insufferable, eardrum-rupturing Scotch twat that covers the
deadline day vinegar strokes, booming away like a foghorn as, say, Bradley Orr arrives at Blackburn
for a routine medical, etc, etc.
By Chris Wright
'Twas a bit of a slow one yesterday as anyone who spent 11-and-a-bit hours 'glued' to the live
feed will tell you, with the total spending across the English leagues failing to surpass the £50
million that Chelsea spaffed on Fernando Torres this time last year let alone the ludicrous £225
million that was spent in total in January of 2011.
By Chris Wright
Here's Chelsea's latest acquisition, promising young Belgian winger Kevin De Bruyne (who
definitely has a whiff of the 'The Sherminator' about him), holding his new
uniform aloft for the cameras at Cobham after signing from Genk for £6.7 million earlier
today.
By Chris Wright
The Sky Sports News 'Babelcopter' takes to the skies once again!
What with it being Transfer Deadline Day and all, we diligent folks at Pies are going to
endeavour to keep you abreast of all the confirmed moves, rubber-stamped loans and the most goddamn
ludicrous rumours that crop up until the window shuts tonight or at least until we can't be arsed
any more.
By Alan Duffy
With a name that makes us all thank the stars for 'copy and paste', Pavel Pogrebnyak looks set
to move to west London in one of the biggest deals so far in this rather moribund transfer
window.
The Russian international striker has never been the most prolific of strikers, however, the
imposing forward is best utilised as a targetman who can hold up the ball, and he'll no doubt be
confident of making a (hard-to-spell) name for himself at Craven Cottage.
By Chris Wright
Eng-lish Pre·mi·um/ing'liSH ˈprēmēəm/Noun: An amount to be paid on top of any given
football transfer fee to recognise the paltry significance of said footballer hailing from these
sceptred isles and will hopefully therefore play with 'bags of passion', etc.
By Chris Wright
After completing his £4.2 million, three-year move to the French capital earlier in the week,
former Chelsea centre-half Alex was officially unveiled by Paris Saint-Germain at the Parc des
Princes yesterday.
Question is, what's he so worried about? I've got a sneaking suspicion that Leonardo's other
hand may be straying 'south of the border' behind that there jersey.
By Chris Wright
One player sure to be high on everybody's list, Zat Knight that is
A few players have hithered and thithered about since the turn of the year but, after a fairly
dormant month on the transfer front and with only 385,589 precious seconds left until the January
window SLAMS SHUT is closed carefully and contentiously by the relevant
personnel, we impatient fools at Pies reckon it's high time to start making big things happen in
our minds.
By Chris Wright
Since signing from Palermo for a shade under £19 million back in 2008, it's fair to say that
Amauri has contributed the square root of f**k all to the Juventus cause. Barring a fairly decent
goal-to-game ratio in debut season, he's been in Layman's Terms dire and, as such, has been
informed by Juve that he is 'free from any obligation vis-a-vis the club commencing from January
2012′ and 'no longer included in the new technical programme'.
By Alan Duffy
Blues Brothers...
All blessed with good footballing names, Rio, Cole and Jay Dasilva are the latest youngsters to
be snapped up by the big boys, after the Luton Town youth players were signed up by Chelsea, each
for a five-figure sum.
By Chris Wright
Made I laugh, so it did...
Via Reddit
By Alan Duffy
Paris-bound?
Filthy stinking rich and proud of it, Paris St Germain are now loaded enough to bid for any
player on the planet, courtesy of the Qatar Investment Authority. And, according to new boss Carlo
Ancelotti, the agents of some of the Premier League's most high-profile strikers have been beating
down his door, looking to secure their clients a lucrative contract in the French capital.
By Alan Duffy
Undoubtedly one of the most consistent defenders in the Premier League over the past few years,
Christopher Samba has finally decided to leave Blackburn Rovers, handing in a transfer request at
the struggling club.
Now 27-years-old, the goal-scoring centre-back is in his prime and no doubt wants to escape the
negativity pervading Ewood Park.
By Alan Duffy
Gooners desperately hoping that Arsene Wenger will finally open his dusty old cheque book and
splash out on Klaas-Jan Huntelaar or Lukas Podolski might have to hold that thought, as, according
to the Guardian, the Arsenal boss is keen on signing up Robin Van Persie's five-year-old boy,
Shaqueel (surely he'll be a basketball player?
By Chris Wright
Nothing more, nothing less. Just a few photos of Darron Gibson holding his new club colours
aloft (he's been allocated Joseph Yobo's old No. 4 shirt at Goodison) after completing his £1
million yes, Everton have spent real, non-Monopoly money on someone!
By Alan Duffy
Despite Manchester United's lack of depth in central midfield, Darron "with an 'o' " Gibson has
been shipped off to Everton, for a reported fee of £1million. The Irishman's four and a half year
deal with the Toffees comes after not long after the Republic of Ireland midfielder was fined by
Sir Alex Ferguson, after a Boxing Day night out with team-mates Wayne Rooney and Jonny Evans had
left the players unfit for training for the following morning.
By Chris Wright
Thirteen years after coming this close you should see how close I'm holding my fingers
right now to joining Villa from Wolves (a financial snag saw him toddle off to Coventry instead) in
1999, Robbie Keane has finally made the move to Villa Park on a two-month loan deal from LA
Galaxy.
By Chris Wright
It's already been well and truly scotched by his agent, but the heftiest kernel of transfer
tripe this morning was a rumour appearing in the Times, The Sun and the Daily Mail that Newcastle
were willing to stump up between £10-£15 million to bring Andy Carroll back to Byker Grove and
that Liverpool may be tempted into cutting their loses on their £35 million lump.
By Rumour Monger
A quick round-up of the best of today's transfer to-ings and fro-ings...
QPR get twitchy...
It has been confirmed that QPR have blinked first and made the first move in the race to snafu
Chris Samba from Blackburn, lodging a £5 million bid for the collosal centre-half.
By Chris Wright
Frank gets as close to heaven as is humanly possible in this Earthly realm
As you may well have noticed, it's January which generally means it's open season for tabloids
and newspapers for grown-ups alike to go big with half-arsed and utterly superfluous football
transfer bulltattle and tittlehonky but not the Daily Mail, for they have themselves an
EXCLUSIVE!
By Chris Wright
As I understand it, the salient bullet points are as follows: Chelsea want to buy Gary Cahill
for £7 million; Bolton want to sell Gary Cahill for £7 million, Gary Cahill wants to join
Chelsea; Gary Cahill's agent asked for £120,000-a-week wages (presumably on the basis he scores
more often than Fernando Torres); Chelsea aren't stupid.
By Chris Wright
In no particular order, Pies' ten-strong run down of the rumoured January deals we'd absolutely
love to see come to fruition for one reason or another...
1. Didier Drogba (Chelsea) to Shanghai Shenhua...
Word is that there are several Chinese clubs queuing up to throw upwards of £400,000-a-week at
The Drog in order to coerce him into semi-retirement.
By Alan Duffy
With only days remaining until the January transfer window opens, club owners and managers are
readying their chequebook and pens (real ones, mind, not the Blankety Blank variety), as they
prepare to make those vital signings to bolster a title tilt or save themselves from a relegation
dogfight.
By Alan Duffy
Arsenal's lack of an alternative cutting edge to Robin van Persie was once again evident in
their 1-1 draw with Wolves at the Emirates on Tuesday. While the home side peppered the Wolves'
goal with shots in that game, they couldn't find a way past Wayne Hennessey.
By Chris Wright
Not that we're giving it much credence, but word in the Daily Mail this morning is that Chelsea
are prepared to listen to offers for Fernando Torres come January in a bid to cut their losses as
£50 million's worth of doleful Spaniard slips ever-further down the pecking order at Stamford
Bridge.
By Chris Wright
Here we go folks. Pies' pick of the top ten Premier League players who are in desperate need of,
or who could simply benefit tremendously from, a loan move come January time...
10. Carlos Tevez, Man City
Let's get the obvious one out of the way up top.
By Alan Duffy
Belgian wing-wizard Eden Hazard has been linked with pretty much every big club in Europe over
the last year, and now his club, Lille, have decided that the attacker is up for sale, albeit at a
rather high price.
£43million will get you the services of the fleet-footed 20-year-old, a figure which will
probably put Arsenal, who have been consistently linked with the player, out of the running.
By Alan Duffy
It is the Daily Star (a highly reputable source, obviously) which links Crystal Palace's
18-year-old attacker to Euro-giants Barcelona and Bayern, but it is still fair to say that the
Ivory Coast-born England U19 star is gaining an increasing number of high profile fans due to his
fancy footwork.
By Chris Wright
As you may have heard by now, Manchester City have suspended Carlos Tevez for a fortnight while
they mull over their options amidst the post-Munich refusenik shitstorm essentially putting
themselves in the lose/lose/lose position of either having to keep hold of the mopey striker and
make him publicly apologise to the City fans.
By Alan Duffy
Having apparently missed out on another footballing bad boy in the shape of El Hadji Diouf,
Doncaster Rovers boss Dean Saunders has now snapped up former Spurs defender Pascal Chimbonda.
The 32-year-old Frenchman, a free agent since leaving QPR in April, was part of Les Bleus' squad
at the 2006 World Cup Finals and has also had spells at Wigan, Sunderland and Blackburn.
By Alan Duffy
The transfer window may well have closed, but nouveau riche Premier League new-boys QPR are
still pondering their next big-money buys. Topping the list is LA Galaxy assist-machine David
"Becks" Beckham, a player who is nearing the end of his three year contract with the Californian
club.
By Alan Duffy
With his disastrous spell at Liverpool now behind him, tricky schemer Joe Cole is looking to
kickstart his career with French champions Lille.
Talking to BBC Sport, the 29-year-old is confident he will rediscover his best form across
the Channel.
By Alan Duffy
Like Gulliver in Lilliput, 6'6″ German giant Per Mertesacker towers above Arsene Wenger's
collection of pint-sized playmakers, including the diminutive Russian Andrei Arshavin.
Arsenal fans wanted height, and lo and behold, the French tactician gave them height.
By Chris Wright
Just look at him, the dirty flirt!
Wes Sneijder has been busy this morning, cork-screwing his metaphorical dagger into the hearts
of thousands of Manchester United fans across the globe by regaling Dutch daily AD with tales of
just how close he came to turning up at Old Trafford over the summer:
"I just felt that it was close, yes [I thought I was going to join Manchester United].
By Alan Duffy
One of a whole gaggle of new players to join Arsenal on transfer deadline day, Israeli captain
Yossi Benayoun has taken little time in celebrating his loan move from west to north London.
On hearing that he will have the No. 30 jersey at the Emirates, rather than the No.
By Alan Duffy
Shaun Wright-Phillips seems to like rich men and rich men seem to like Sean Wright-Phillips.
Yesterday, the under-achieving, fleet-footed stepson of Arsenal legend Ian Wright squeezed his way
out of the overcrowded Manchester City dressing room yesterday and followed the money yet again,
this time to join Premier League wealthy new-boys Queens Park Rangers.
By Alan Duffy
Football punditry is a cushy number indeed. Apparently, you don't even have to know anything
about the actual footballers you are talking about, particularly if they are "foreign chaps".
From Paul Merson and the Sky Soccer Saturday crew to Match Of The Day's Holy Trinity of
Lawrenson, Hansen and Shearer, ignorance is apparently bliss.
By Alan Duffy
Football punditry is a cushy number indeed. Apparently, you don't even have to know anything
about the actual footballers you are talking about, particularly if they are "foreign chaps".
From Paul Merson and the Sky Soccer Saturday crew to Match Of The Day's Holy Trinity of
Lawrenson, Hansen and Shearer, ignorance is apparently bliss.
