Extraordinary Swindle

He seemed to combine better with Kuyt/Gerrard than Crouch in the game last night.

It's not always agout the money. Some of the feckers want guaranteed first team places or only want to play where they want to as opposed to where they are instructed to. Rafa wants players that will be commited to Liverpool FC, not mercenaries or problematic egos.

Looks like Gonzalez is finally off to Betis. (link)

You can't sign players that aren't available or don't want to join the club.

Ayala has bought himself out of his contract at Valencia to move to Zaragoza (link), so it looks like Heinze can do so too.

They have to be registered with the club for three years between the age of 15 and 21 to be considered academy players in the eyes of UEFA. Nationality of the players is not an issue.

From 2008, 8 of the squad for the UEFA competitions must be "home grown" players. Four of the eight must come through the club's own academy.

Another factor is the rules regarding 'home grown' players in UEFA competition. When are we likely to see another bunch of local kids come through the academy and nail down first team places? The likes of Fowler, Owen, McManaman, Gerrard and Carragher are very thin on the ground. From 2008, the squad for all UEFA competitions must include 8 players that went through a domestic league academy. Four of which have to have been with the club for at least three years between the age of 15 and 21. That's where the recruitment of the likes of Dani Pacheco will really pay off if he fulfills his potential.

Hopefully Daniel Alves will show the same level of commitment to joining Liverpool. Finnan isn't going to be around forever and it would be great to get Alves to replace him as he comes in to his prime.

The Premier League have got themselves in to a corner and have to back West Ham up on this with regards to the club owning the player's registration. West Ham sent a letter to MSI and their solicitors terminating the third party contract, allowing Tevez to play for the club until the end of the season. The solicitors replied saying Kia Joorabchian and MSI retained all rights to the player. Tevez's registration should have been torn up at that point. Doing a deal with Man Utd without the consent of West Ham would suggest that the third party contract is still in place, so Tevez's registration should have been suspended for the end of the season and West Ham relegated.

Are you sure it wasn't $CDN? Approx. £17M

That was so good I had to add it to his Wikipedia page - hope you don't mind. Will be interesting to see how long it stays there.

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Sven is good mates with Abramovich so City will become the home of Mourinho's cast offs.

The sports arbitration report suggests we have him on loan - similar deal to that which West Ham had except the third party can't force the sale of the player. Report. Page 5 details the dodgy third party agreement. Page 29 details what went on in January with regards to the delay with Mascherano's registration for Liverpool.

Fernando Torres - I've seen him do the RVN active/passive offside goal trick a few times so we've got that covered. Andriy Voronin scores the tap ins.

He signed a 2 year extension last week.

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Coincidently Boulahrouz has been offered to Sevilla at a knock down price.

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Apparently we do now!

We don't need to sign a 17 goal a season player for midfield in order to win the league. If the team took a more positive attitude on to the pitch in Away fixtures the away form would be better. Also not rotating the starting line-up too much at the start of the season in order to build up a bit of form might help things.