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]

Australian Mark Bosnich, who rose to fame with Manchester United and Aston Villa and then infamy with Chelsea FC has returned to the game after 7 years off, this tim signing with A-League side Central Coast Mariners at the age of 36.

Bosnich, who first tested positive for drugs in 2002 after a bitter divorce, had a very high profile relationship with model Sophie Anderton which saw him fall from grace in the football world quickly, ending in 2003.

Bosnich has since declared himself the fittest he’s ever been and has of late been doing commentary with FOX Sports for the Socceroo’s and the FA Cup Finals.

Central Coast finished first in the league and runner’s up in the Finals for the 2007/08 season and the 36 year old will be backing up Australian goalie of the future Danny Vukovic.

Bosnich quotes after the Jump… (more…)

Remember Mateja Kezman?

Yup, the Mateja Kezman that The Special One signed from Dutch side PSV Eindhoven for 5.3 Million Pound after the young Serbian forward dropped 126 goals in 172 matches.

After failing to cement his place in the Chelsea side and only starting 14 times (although he appeared in 37 total games, scoring 7 goals),  Kezman was sold to the other Madrid, Atletico Madrid for just a tad higher than what Chelsea had paid.

Once again Kezman featured for just one season (appearing in just 33 matches, scoring 10 times) before being sold to Turkish giants Fenerbache for $9.75 Million, scoring 26 times in 56 appearances in two seasons.

Now Kezman is off once again, this time to Ligue1 side PSG after the French club paid 4 Million Euro (and the 1 Million Euro the 29 year old had to pay himself to get out of his Fenerbache contract) for the very talented player known for being hotheaded.

With a once very promising Serbian National Team career at his feet with 49 appearances and 17 goals, Kezman has not been recalled since his sending off against Argentina in the 2006 World Cup.

image via Photos4

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]

With the signing of Robinho looking pretty likely for Chelsea, there are rumblings that Joe Cole could be headed to Liverpool. That would be quite the switcheroo. Not sure if this one will happen or not, but if Robinho does end up at Chelsea, I could see a move like this very likely for Joe Cole.

Abhishek Thakur over at Goal has a great look at the 2008 Summer Transfer Window moves and ranks them accordingly.

While I think he ranks Gio Dos Santos WAYYYYYY too low and Mathieu Flamini is WAYYYYY too high, for the most part I’ve got to agree with the way he sees the game.
image via Mis

UPDATE - Johnson’s deal is finally finished after agreeing to a four year deal with Fulham.

While he was forced to sit on the outside as he waited for Everton and Fulham to come to an agreement over past injury payments, Johnson’s eventual 10.5 Million Pound move was finalized.

Via The Sun

“I am glad that the agreement is now finalised and that I can concentrate on playing football for Fulham. Roy has been great over the last week or so of on-going discussions and his support in getting me here has only strengthened my ambition to give 100 per cent for him and the team every game.

“Fulham is a club with a lot of history and ambition and I’m pleased that I can be part of that. I’m now just looking forward to getting into the dressing room with the lads and to start training with them as soon as possible.”

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The ongoing battle between MLS, New England Revolution and the Columbus Crew finally ended today as our boy Pat Noonan was re-acquired by Major League Soccer and the Revolution, then promptly traded to the Columbus Crew for their 2009 1st Round Pick, Allocation Money and ended with swapping their Allocation Spots as the Revs now have the Number 3 position and the Crew down to the 10th.

All of the haggling surrounding Noonan’s return to Major League Soccer revolved initially on Noonan leaving for free at the beginning of 2008 after the Revolution wanted him to take a significant pay cut. With MLS understandably unwilling to pay to get him back in the league even though Columbus had the funds and the right numbers for Noonan to come back, it took two months for the deal to finalize.

The Revolution get ALOT out of this deal as they are in a great situation without Noonan, top of the table in the East, not on the hook for his salary AND (the most important part) they never used or was allocated anything for the initial loss of Noonan when he signed for Norwegian side Aalesunds FK.

image via Wiki

And they also acquire his wife WAG Sylvie in the same deal.   Bet we won’t hear her complaining about leaving Germany for Madrid.

DOUBLE UPDATE - Done deal as Real Madrid are set to announce van der Vaart Tuesday morning.

UPDATE - If Real Madrid President Ramon Calderon has his way, van der Vaart will be presented to the Galactico faithful by next week.

It’s believed that Madrid upped it’s original offer to the 10 Million Euro mark and with the teams set to meet in the Emirates Pre-Season Tournament this weekend, Bernd Schuster might very well get his man.

When a player either is within the last six months of his contract OR has a clause in his contract that stipulates that he can move to any club in the world he so chooses for only 1 Million Euro in 12 months, as the Chairman when do you pull the trigger and take as much as you can get?

Dutchman Rafael van der Vaart scored 21 goals in 44 matches last season while leading Hamburg SV to 4th place in the 2007/08 Bundesliga and reaching the round of 16 in the UEFA Cup competition as the teams Captain.

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UPDATE - Lilian Thurman has called time on a brilliant career that saw him play for some of the biggest clubs (Monaco, Parma, Juventus and Barcelona) in the world, as well as win the World Cup Trophy in 1998 with France.

The 36 year old, who won a record 142 caps for France, is quitting following the discovery of a cardiac malformation (similar to the one that cost his brother his life on a basketball court) during a medical taken in June ahead of a prospective move to Paris St Germain.

This is one of those stories where you really hope there’s a happy ending.

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