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Nov

2008

Premier League looms....

Thursday, 07 August 2008

The ultimate honour awaits

With the season looming in about 10 days’ time, it is imperative that viewers and readers get themselves ready to what is about to happen. The Premier League is about to kick off soon enough. The Community Shield between Manchester United and Portsmouth will take place on August 9th 2008. But how are all the teams stacking up and what are their preparations so far? Here’s the drill down. Chelsea, who have since brought in Luis Felipe Scolari as their new manager have since brought in Deco with him who has said that he will try and light up the midfield. Frank Lampard, who over the summer has been linked numerous times with his ex-boss Jose Mourinho at Inter Milan looked set NOT to go. So it looks interesting in midfield of the Blues now with the likes of Deco, Lampard, Essien all ready to pounce to make an impact in the league. Chelsea too have bought Bosingwa which makes it 2 Portuguese signings. Apparently, they are still trying to get Robinho.

Olof Mellberg has left Aston Villa and joined Juventus, and the transfer saga which involves team captain of the Villains Gareth Barry to Liverpool FC seemed imminent at the moment, but have yet to be concluded. Note that this saga has gone on for 3 months now. Brad Friedel has also joined Villa from Blackburn Rovers while Steve Sidwell was bought from Chelsea FC for a 5million pounds fee. Another team that has been actively rebuilding over the summer is Tottenham Hotspur. Team manager Juande Ramos have sold Robbie Keane to Liverpool FC for a whooping £19 million. Other players sold include Pascal Chimbonda and Anthony Gardner. He has added in his team Steed Malbranque and the illustrious Luka Modric from Croatia. Liverpool FC on the other hand has sold John Arne Riise to AS Roma for £4 million. Harry Kewell was released on a free transfer to Turkish side Galatasaray while Peter Crouch was offloaded to Portsmouth FC, all to help finance the purchase of Republic of Ireland captain Robbie Keane. Anthony Le Tallec, who has had very limited chances in the first team was finally sold off to French side Le Mans. Scott Carson would finally find his number 1 jersey at West Brom while a few more are being targeted out to finance the purchase of Gareth Barry. Other additional players in the Reds team this season are relatively unheard of like Andrea Dossena, Diego Cavalieri, the Brazilian goalkeeper, David Ngog from Paris St Germain and Philip Degen.

Arsenal faces an uphill task of re-building as they face an exodus of players leaving which includes Matthiu Flamini, Jens Lehmann, Alexander Hleb and Gilberto Silva. Additions to the Gunners are Amaury Bischoff, Samir Nasri and Anthony Ramsey while Manchester United have had a pretty quiet summer with no particular transfers. The only drama that perhaps came about with the Red Devils was the persistence of midfielder Cristiano Ronaldo’s desire to leave the club and asking Spanish giant Real Madrid to buy him. All that has since been laid to rest and it seemed now that he is most likely to stay in Manchester instead of plying his trade over in Spain.

Apart from players, there are also a string of new bosses in around the Premier League. Manchester City sacked their coach Sven Goran Eriksson at the close season and replaced him with Mark Hughes who left Blackburn Rovers. Paul Ince, otherwise known as ‘the Guvnor’ took over at Ewood Park and have since sold David Bentley to Spurs, they are keen to buy Jermaine Pennant from Liverpool but are still negotiating the transfer fees. Tal Ben Haim has since joined Manchester City from Chelsea after finding that first team football are harder to come by at the already superstar packed London team. Sun Jihai has also left Manchester City to join Sheffield United while Khalid Boulahrouz have also left Chelsea to play in VFB Stuttgart.

More transfer news to follow….

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