CHELSEA
Blues complete Moses deal
Chelsea finally completed their swoop for Wigan forward Victor Moses on Friday after the Nigeria international passed a medical and agreed personal terms with the European champions. The Blues had seen four bids for Moses rejected by Wigan chairman Dave Whelan during the course of a fractious transfer saga that had lasted since the end of last season. Whelan had infuriated Chelsea by speaking publicly about the negotiations in a bid to drive up the price, but Chelsea boss Roberto Di Matteo got his man at the fifth attempt after Wigan confirmed on Thursday that they had accepted an improved offer, believed to be around £9 million (US$14.2 million), for the 21-year-old. Chelsea did not announce the length of the contract for Moses.
BAYERN MUNICH
Coach Heynckes to quit
Coach Jupp Heynckes will quit Bayern Munich at the end of the season when his contract expires, according to a report that was to appear in yesterday’s edition of Munich’s Sueddeutsche Zeitung. According to the report, the 67-year-old has already told Bayern president Uli Hoeness and chairman Karl-Heinz Rummenigge he is not prepared to extend his contract, which expires in June next year. “The club has already said, in December, in January, or in spring we will sit down and talk again. But I am not 37 anymore. At the end of the day, it doesn’t matter whether the trainer is young or old. The only important thing is to bring success to Bayern Munich,” Heynckes told the newspaper.
SWANSEA
Ki costs reported £6m
Ki Sung-yueng joined Swansea on Friday after the Premier League club agreed to pay Scottish champions Celtic an undisclosed club-record fee for the South Korea midfielder. Ki has agreed a three-year contract and will now wait for a work permit and international clearance before officially joining up with his new teammates at the Liberty Stadium. The 23-year-old, reported to have cost £6 million, admitted he cannot wait to eventually get his first taste of Premier League action after watching the English top-flight as a young boy.
NORWICH CITY
Rennes sign over Tettey
Premier League club Norwich City signed Norway midfielder Alexander Tettey from French side Rennes for an undisclosed fee on Friday. Tettey agreed a two-year contract with an option for a further year and will complete his move to England subject to international clearance. The 26-year-old, who spent three years in Ligue 1 with Rennes, became Norwich manager Chris Hughton’s seventh signing.
SUNDERLAND
Mackems snap up Johnson
Sunderland signed England winger Adam Johnson from champions Manchester City for an undisclosed fee on Friday. Johnson agreed a four-year contract with the Black Cats and became manager Martin O’Neill’s second signing in the space of a few hours after he swooped for Wolves striker Steven Fletcher earlier on Friday. O’Neill had been tracking Johnson for several weeks and it is reported Sunderland paid around £10 million to beat Tottenham and Everton in the race to secure the former Middlesbrough winger’s signature. The Johnson deal takes O’Neill’s Friday spending spree to almost £25 million after he paid a reported £15 million for Fletcher.
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