The latest transfer gossip, rumours and damned lies
Kolo Toure to Manchester City
Not content with prising compassionate striker Manu Adebayor away from the Emirates, the Citizen’s are lining up a £12m bid for Kolo Toure, say The Independent.
The Spoiler truth-o-meter: City want to buy a defender? Come on, pull the other one.
Javier Mascherano to Barcelona
While Joan Laporta was welcoming Zlatan Ibrahimovic and trying to kick Samuel Eto’o out of the door, Barca vice president Rafael Yuste confirmed his admiration of the Liverpool midfielder:
“I can confirm that Javier Mascherano is a fantastic player that personally I like a lot. But we have not listed (him).
“We have a lot of players who want to come to Barcelona. Mascherano is a fantastic player,
Which division would triumph in an MLS All-Stars style match?
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The Spoiler was surprised by the results of yesterday’s poll, where 76% of you disagreed with Cristiano Ronaldo’s claim that La Liga was stronger than the Premier League.
That poll took into account a number of factors: for example the difference between the best and worst teams, entertainment value and European success. Today, we want to focus on which is the better league in terms of galacticos.
Let us know which of the two teams we’ve created to represent each league is stronger - and if you disagree with our line-ups tell us who you would pick instead - with a vote and comment below:
The latest transfer gossip, rumours and damned lies…
Javier Mascherano to Barcelona Concerned by the departure of Eidur Gudjohnsen, and the fact that Yaya Toure and Seydou Keita will be absent for a large portion of next season thanks to the African Cup of Nations, the Champions of Europe may turn to the Argentinean defensive midfielder. “Few players are rated so highly by the powers that be at Barcelona,” says Spanish paper Sport.
The Spoiler truth-o-meter: Rafa will take some persuading on this one, but the Spanish press seem to think €25m will do the trick.
Edin Dzeko to Arsenal The Daily Mail believe the Gunners are joining the race for the jewel in Wolfsburg’s Bundesliga-winning
The chances are you’ll come up with something better than us
It wasn’t until The Spoiler tried to figure out how we would set Liverpool up tonight that we realised just how tough a task Rafael Benitez faces. They need to field as attacking a line-up as possible without leaving themselves so vulnerable at the back that they risk humiliation. After lots of umming and ahhing, here’s what we settled on:
Playing without full-backs is risky with Florent Malouda and Salomon Kalou both likely to start for Chelsea so we’d need Jamie Carragher and Daniel Agger to move wide a lot with Javier Mascherano operating as a virtual centre-back at times. The reason we chose Sami Hyypia over Martin Skrtel is that he has scored in three previous Champions League quarter-finals for Liverpool and could unsettle a Chelsea defence missing John Terry at set-pieces.
Our approach is fairly suicidal so if you have a better way of balancing all-out attack with a steady defence, let us know with a comment below.
The two bosses have now shown a similar taste in enemies
Those who have noted similarities between Alan Pardew and Phil Brown were provided with even more ammunition last night when the Hull boss followed in Pardew’s footsteps by falling out with Arsene Wenger.
Obvious comparisons between the two include that both enjoyed an initial period of fantastic overachievement after winning promotion to the Premier League and went on strong FA Cup runs. Both managers made their clubs’ record signing in their first January in the top-flight (Dean Ashton and Jimmy Bullard) and both men suffered long-term injuries at a crucial time.
Negatively, both managers have received criticism for some of their methods: Pardew for his sloganed T-shirts and training complex revamps and Brown for
Liverpool - who have lost only one of their last sixteen Champions League games - entertain Real Madrid at Anfield tonight, knowing they simply have to keep the visitors from scoring to progress in the competition.
As underdogs of sorts, Los Blancos must do everything in their power to gain an advantage. With his comments diminishing Liverpool and their historic stadium, Juande Ramos appears to have delivered a big blow in the pre-match mind games:
“I’ve got absolutely no fear of what lies ahead. With all the respect in the world for Liverpool and Rafa Benitez, I’ve been a coach at some of the great stadiums in the world, either in charge of the home side or with the opposition team.
“Coincidentally I never took Spurs to Anfield so it will be my first time on the bench there. But Anfield just isn’t a bigger deal than the Bernabeu, the San Siro or the Camp Nou - and I’ve seen all those before.”
Some very assumptuous words from a man who has never actually managed a team at Anfield before.
Meanwhile, feisty Argentinean Javier Mascherano has hit back at the Spaniards with some extremely unsubtle
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