Malouda on the move

The news today, in transfer talk it seems that Chesea may be leading the race to sign Malouda with a reported fee of around 17 million pounds. Liverpool are in second place, which will not make Benitez happy. Decent winger at about the same price that Man Utd paid for Nani, but with more experience and a good World Cup run under his belt, but having two top teams interested obviously pushed the money up a fair bit. He's usually deployed as a winger, so it seems that Mourinho may be rejigging his tactics for next season aftre deploying the more narrow diamond midfield for much of last season. If he gets Malouda and keeps Robben, then he'll have some pretty decent attacking wingers along with Joe Cole and Kalou. Could see a return to the 5 man midfield with Ballack, Lampard and Essien forming the centre with the others fighting for a place on the wing, Mikel and Sidwell would rotate in the midfield, though thsi does mean only one striker out of Sheva, Drogba and Pizarro...will be interesting to see what happens. The other decent transfer talk of the day involves Tottenham closing in on Younes Kaboul, a young central defender from Auxerre who carries around a 8 million price tag, hefty weight for a young defender. Never seen him, but reports make him sound highly promising and he has captained the French U-21 side. He'll probably start on the bench this season since central defence is such an important position that any new players have to be bedded in slowly, but with King never far from the operating table, he may get some starts sooner then he thinks.

More takeover talk, Blackburn are in talks with American based businessman Daniel Williams who stresses that he is in the early stages of a takeover process. He makes all the right noises about not changing a huge amount to the club, but this is obviously going to be a long drawn out process so I'll keep you updated. Thaksin Shinawatra's bid for Man City is apparently still on track despite his frozen bank accounts and the corruption investigation. Not sure what to believe on this one so think I'll just play it safe and wait and see. Our final takeover gossip involves talks between Stan Kroenke, Peter Hill-Wood and Keith Edelman in the USA, as you should all know Kroenke has been buying up Arsenal shares and this was a clear-the-air meeting. It seems as if some air was cleared and reports seem quietly encouraging with the Arsenal directors stating that they might work with him in the future, though another statement shall be made soon. The Arsenal board are doing the right thing, squaring off against Kroenke was never going to solve any uncertanties so this is a step in the right direction, and hopefully more should be known later this week.

Finally, the verdict on the Sheffield United hearing should be out by the end of the month so I shall be waiting to give my brilliant opinion on the issue. Night all.