The Rumour Room: Daily Round-Up

Rounding up all the days biggest transfer news and gossip.

Arsene Wenger Slaps Jean-Louis Triaud In The Face… Figuratively Speaking
Bordeaux president Jean-Louis Triaud has slated the Arsenal manager for his insulting £5M bid for striker Marouane Chamakh. Wenger has been interested in acquiring the services of the striker for a few weeks and has his initial bid turned down.

I was speaking with an Arsenal supporter today. The fact that we spent more time actually laughing than discussing this says it all really. Arsene does like to try his bits, but perhaps he is right. £10M for a relatively unheard of striker seems a bit excessive, however this is the same with the whole Alonso saga. If you want to buy a player from a club that is reluctant to let him go, you have to meet their valuation.

Bordeaux know that Chamakh wants to leave, it doesn’t help the fact that the player has stated on more than one occasion that a move to the Emirates would be his dream.

Likelihood Rating: Yes, but Wenger will have to up his bid. – 8/10

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Chelsea And Manchester United To Splash £100M
The Daily Mail claims that Chelsea look will go on a £100m spending spree this week in a bid to sign Andrea Pirlo, Franck Ribery and Sergio Aguero. Manchester United also seem to have money to burn and are reported to be preparing bids for David Silva, David Villa and Sergio Aguero.

Lets tackle the Chelsea spending spree first. Pirlo will no doubt be playing in blue next season as he has publicly stated his desire to play under new Chelsea boss, Ancelotti. As for Ribery, Bayern just do not want to sell their prize asset and I feel even a bid tabled at around £80M may not be enough to convince them to say goodbye. In regards to Aguero, he is a Liverpool fan and has stated in the past that he would like to play for them one day. A move to any of these clubs would most certainly ruin this dream of his, so that crosses him off the list. I think Chelsea should perhaps be looking at younger players, their current squad seems to be filled with ageing ones. Ok sure, age is wisdom and all that, but wisdom and experience can only take you so far, and that certainly isn’t a full 90 minutes.

As for United. It seems every time Liverpool are interested in a player of high quality, they aren’t far behind. If United try I can see them ending up with either Villa or Silva, although Silva would be the more likely candidate. I’m forced to ask though… Do United even need all these players. They have Giggs, Nani, Valencia, even Rooney who play the wings, so surely they don’t need another winger. And they have Berbatov, Owen, Rooney as well as a couple of young strikers who definitely make the grade, so I cant see them needing another striker. I think this is just a case of Ferguson trying to wind up the Liverpool fans. – It works very well may I add.

Likelihood Rating: Pirlo will probably be a Chelsea player come the end of the transfer window, 8/10 – As for all the other rumours, I don’t believe them for one second, 2/10

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Liverpool News: Alonso, Martinez and Aquilani.
I awoke this morning hopeful that perhaps the day could pass without some repetitive article being published about Alonso. Low and behold it took all of 10 minutes before I discover that, after all that has gone on, Alonso could well be a Liverpool player next season. The Daily Mirror, The Daily Mail and The Telegraph are all posting contradictory articles. The Mirror states that Rafa will make a last ditch attempt in keeping Alonso, The Star say that Rafa wont budge with his £30M valuation of the player leaving negotiations at a stand still, while The Telegraph say that Liverpool’s managing director Christian Purslow met his Real Madrid counterpart Jose Angel Sanchez in Barcelona to complete negotiations.

How confusing, especially when you add the fact that reports in Spain suggest that Liverpool have signed Aquilani for £15.3M. Its no lie that Spanish newspaper Marca are not known for their honesty, so personally I would wait until Sky Sports, BBC or LFT.tv confirm it before jumping for joy… Or not. I make no secret about my thoughts on Aquilani. I am not convinced at all that this will work out so well, especially after a conversation with a friend, who may I add is an Avid Italy fan. He seems to think that Aquilani will be a fringe player at best. I on the other hand haven’t seen enough of the player to pass proper judgement, so I guess its up to him to prove me wrong, and Rafa right.

In other news Rafa looks set to reignite his chase of Athletic Bilbao midfielder Javi Martinez who has been dubbed ‘Alonso MKII’. I see this lad as more of a Kaka type player. Now I’m not saying he is going to be as good as Kaka is, but he is much more attacking than Alonso and at £10M Rafa would do incredibly well to bring him to Anfield…

Likelihood Rating: Martinez to Liverpool? I do hope so – 7/10.

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UPDATE: Lescott To City - Arsenal Fans Take Note.
The boys over at Arseblog have had some news on the “down low” that Senderos is practically an Everton player. Should this be true then Everton are preparing for life without Lescott as Manchester City look to claim yet another victim.

Various sources state that David Moyes is trying to hang onto Lescott, but the player himself is keen on a move to Eastland – In knowing this City are set to up their pursuit of Lescott and I feel its only a matter of time before the Everton manager collapses under the pressure and gives into City. Should City fail to land Lescott, which I doubt, they will look to land Chelsea centre back, John Te… Wait that was last week. This week it will be Alex they are hunting for. City also look set to Break Moyes’ heart further by beating him to the signature of highly rated Newcastle Defender, Bassong.

As I’m sat here writing this article and it has me thinking… “What the hell are you playing at Mr. Wenger?” He seems to be selling his entire team to the highest bidder without actively searching for their replacements. Mind you I’m not going to second guess Arsene, he probably has a master plan to all this.

Likelihood Rating: Lescott is a City player. You know it, I know it and Lescott knows it. The only person who doesn’t know it is, Moyes. -9/10

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Tottenham Camp Busy As They Keep Tabs On Mo Sissoko
Don’t worry, its not the ex Liverpool player – “Tottenham Hotspur have held talks with Moussa Sissoko’s advisers after signing Patrick Vieira from Inter Milan became increasingly unlikely.” (The Times)

Tottenham look to continue their spending this summer with the addition of a defensive midfielder. I have seen Sissoko play a few times, and he looks like he would be a very good member of the Tottenham first team. Especially with a back four who are more injury prone than [Insert clever comparison here].

Spurs are also looking at Brazilian Midfielder Sandro, who plays for Internacional, while Darren Bent looks to be on the verge of moving to Sunderland for £12M.

In other news Harry Redknapp looks to go digging for Cole but I just cant see Chelsea letting him go easily. I will argue that had Cole stayed fit last season for Chelsea, their season could have finished a lot differently. I feel the player could well be up for a move, it is World Cup year next year after all.

Likelihood Rating: Cole to Spurs? Possible but not likely – 4/10.

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