Dutch winger Arjen Robben is to quit Premiership giants Chelsea for Real Madrid, who will shell out 20 million euros (US$26 million) on the winger, Spanish media said yesterday.
"Green light for Robben," trumpeted the AS sports daily, quoting chairman Ramon Calderon as saying that "we need a director of the orchestra."
AS said at the weekend that Liga champions Real had struck an agreement in London with Robben's father and agent and were waiting only on Chelsea's acceptance.
Robben is currently in negotiations with Chelsea over a contract extension until 2012 but has not always been in favor with the club's Portuguese coach Jose Mourinho, who AS said has now reconciled himself to the transfer.
AS said Mourinho would replace Robben, 23, with midfielder Florent Malouda, who is widely expected to quit French champions Lyon.
The newspaper also reported that Real would see off opposition from Barcelona and Inter Milan for AS Roma's Romanian defender Cristian Chivu, quoting agent Victor Becali as saying: "Who wouldn't want to play for Real Madrid. Of course Chivu does."
Saying the transfer was imminent, Becali added Chivu would go to the club that "puts the most money on the table," which would see Real land their man for some 16 million euros.
Real's other major targets as they seek to rebuild in the post-David Beckham era are AC Milan's Brazilian playmaker Kaka and Arsenal's Spanish midfielder Cesc Fabregas.
The club are also building from the top down and were later in the week widely expected to confirm German Bernd Schuster, a former star midfielder with Real as well as Barcelona, the club's new coach.
Schuster is fresh from leading modest Getafe to the Spanish Cup final and turning them into a top half of the table Liga outfit.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but
Taiwanese gymnast Lee Chih-kai failed to secure an Olympic berth in the pommel horse following a second-place finish at the last qualifier in Doha on Friday, a performance that Lee and his coach called “unconvincing.” The Tokyo Olympics silver medalist finished runner-up in the final after scoring 6.6 for degree of difficulty and 8.800 for execution for a combined score of 15.400. That was just 0.100 short of Jordan’s Ahmad Abu Al Soud, who had qualified for the event in Paris before the Apparatus World Cup series in Qatar’s capital. After missing the final rounds in the first two of four qualifier