It seems Nemanja Vidic is so fed up with England’s gloomy skies and incessant rain that he is casting envious glances towards sunny Spain.

‘I will never stay to live in England, that’s for sure,’ said Vidic in a Russian magazine. ‘The climate here is something special! You get only a brief glimpse of sunlight before it’s all cloudy again. The winters are mild but in summer the temperatures seldom go higher than 20 degrees Celsius. And it rains, rains, rains! In England they say that Manchester is the city of rain. Its main attraction is considered to be a timetable at the railway station where trains leave for other, less rainy cities!’ As if the rain isn’t enough to moan about, he criticises the joyless way of life and admits he misses the social life he enjoyed with his team-mates in Moscow….

….Clearly he needs a quality WAG to spice up life in gloomy Madchester.

Image via Yimg

UPDATE - What does it say about Sir Alex that he lets one of his defenders that could play center-back and left-back head over to The Voyeur and Arsenal, one of Manchester United’s biggest rivals?

Better yet, what does that say about the Mikael Silvestre or The Voyeur’s faith in William Gallas?

Mikael Silvestre had looked set to join either Man City or Sunderland, but now The Voyeur has stepped in and is looking to bring his fellow Frenchmen to The Emirates. Looks like Arsenal will offer Manchester United somewhere in the range of £750,000 for his services. Craziest thing about this potential move? In the 12 years since Arsene Wenger has been at Arsenal, he and Sir Alex have never traded any players.

[Via Daily Mail]

UPDATE - With the Berbatov to United rumors comes the Frederic Kanoute to Tottenham talk.

Yes, that Kanoute, the one who fell out of favor with then head coach David Pleat after heading out to the African Nations Cup with Mali. Kanoute scored 14 goals for Spurs in 60 matches only three years ago before moving to Sevilla and La Liga for 6.5 Million Pound, and finding the back of the net 43 times in 94 matches.

The move would once again link up Kanoute with former Sevilla head coach Juande Ramos.

Right at the beginning of the 2008 Summer Transfer Window, all signs were pointing to Tottenham Hotspur forward Dimitar Berbatov making a big money move to Manchester United. That was before the Tottenham brass reported Sir Alex and his staff to the Football Association over their pursuit of the Bulgarian.

After last weekends Community Shield win over Portsmouth, Sir Alex said he hoped to have a new “attacking” player signed within the next week and he might finally be close to landing his man.

With Zenit and Russian striker Andrei Arshavin’s price tag still considerably high, Spurs head coach Juande Ramos might use the sale of Berbatov to Manchester United (reported to be around 28 Million Pound) as the funding needed to pool together just a bit more cash, along with the money from the sale of Robbie Keane to Liverpool.

(more…)

Looks like the Dimitar Berbatov saga might be wrapping up with the striker on the verge of a £28m move to Manchester United. As with damn near every other transfer this summer, this one has been dragged out way longer than it should. With the season kicking off this weekend, and Manchester United taking their official team photos this Friday, look for this one to be wrapped up very, very soon.

[Via The Guardian]

Portsmouth - Diarra (Miss - Over), Defoe, Mvuembe (Save - Middle), Johnson (Miss - Over)

Manchester United -  Tevez, Giggs, Carrick

I don’t know about you, but my Tivo stopped recording right before the PK’s.

Former Manchester United player Ben Collett was awarded a 4.5 Million Pound settlement in the case that saw his career ended in a tackle during a Reserve Team match against Middlesbrough five years ago.

Mrs. Justice Swift of the London High Court awarded Collett the amount based on the likelihood of the former players chances of earning a Professional contract with the club at 13,000 Pound a week, the testimony of Sir Alex and Gary Neville and the admission of Liability for the injury from Middlesbrough and former player Gary Smith.

Smith, now 24 plays at Brentford FC while Collett is studying English at Leeds University.

image via ManUtdPics 

The Cristiano Ronaldo transfer saga is officially dunzo. Here is a direct quote from CRon7 himself.

“So, I can confirm that I’ll be playing for Manchester United next season. And before there are any rumours and speculation about me staying against my will, I want to make one thing clear: whoever says or writes anything to that effect is lying. I’ll be playing at Manchester United with my heart and soul. I will fight and honour the shirt with the same desire and dedication as I always have.” - Cristiano Ronaldo to Publico

To read the entire transcript of this interview, click here

Sir Alex is saying the Cristiano Ronaldo to Real Madrid saga is all over, but Spanish paper Marca is reporting that Ronaldo is not going to report to Manchester at the end of the week as he is required to do.

Remember when I was just saying?

This is so far from being over in my opinion, especially when Madrid is saying that van der Vaart is their last and only major signing of the summer.

image via Starpulse

Manchester United youngsters 2 - Peterborough nil.

What a crack by Darron Gibson.

He came close to dropping two dimes like he did in the old days, but it was still the perfect sending off match for Manchester United legend Ole Gunnar Solskjaer.

As per the usual for a testimonial match, all gate receipts went to the Norwegian hitman (Thank You Danny - All the gate receipts/program sales have gone to Unicef’s ‘Schools for Africa’ project. The £2mill will build 10 schools, not line Ole’s pocket) as Manchester United beat La Liga side Espanyol 1-nil with a team that was made up of a mixture of first team and reserve team players.

Solskjaer is now the head coach of Man U’s Reserve Team.