Au revoir Gunners, Bonjour Barca!

Bonjour Barca! Thierry Henry has admitted his love for Barcelona and a switch to Camp Nou are imminent now. Barcelona has reportedly agreed to pay Gunners £16million for Henry and only medical examination yet to be done before the Catalan club parade him later today in a press conference. Barcelona is building a new galacticos at Camp Nou with a strike force of Eto'o, Ronaldinho, Henry and Messi. Frank Rijkaard summer spending doesn't end here, there are more players to be sign. But where is our signing?

Henry, Arsenal's all-time record goalscorer with 226 goals from 364 appearances was signed by Arsene Wenger in 1999 from Juventus will be deeply miss by Gunners fans. He's truly a gentleman and a professional footballer on and off the pitch. All I can say about Henry is, he's a true servant and loyal to Arsenal through thicks and thins but now it's time for him to move on as his age is catching up. He'll be 30 year old in two months time.

Chill out Gunners, at least you'll see new players coming in or may I say former player in the likes of Nicolas Anelka cos we still left clueless by the owners on who's going to join us.


YNWA,
Red's Fury™

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Poll closed

Due to overwhelming votes for Thierry Henry 35/59 (59%), I've decided to close this poll as news on Henry moving to Spanish giant Barcelona has been confirmed by the player himself. A new poll will be setup shortly here. Stay tune for more updates!

YNWA,
Red's Fury™

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Bellamy for Italian job?

Craig Bellamy has been offered an unexpected chance to play in Italy after Juventus and Roma entered the market for the controversial Liverpool forward.

The Wales captain is expected to leave Anfield this summer, having struggled to adapt to Rafael Benitez's rotation policy during his debut season at the club. He represents a profitable asset for a Liverpool manager seeking to maximise his transfer budget.


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Tora! Tora! Torres!

Fernando Torres, 23 year old Spanish striker and Atletico Madrid's captain was in the center of the media attention this week. Just weeks ago, we've been linked with Henry, Villa, Eto'o and Bent which hasn't produced any positive signs for them. Now the press are widely speculating about Torres buy-out-clause worth £27million and revived the 3 major talking points on why he should be donning the red shirt? But Liverpool is not the only team that chasing for his signature, Chelsea and Manchester United are monitoring the situation very closely too. News from Atletico said 'Torres is not for sale'! Looks like Atletico Madrid ready to cash-in on him as his contract expires in 2009 and force us to trigger Torres's clause. Since they're playing hardball over the transfer fee, Rafa need an alternative persuasion. Report from Echo saying that Luis Garcia will be use as a bargaining chip.

If Fernando is worth £27million, then Rafa have to dig-deep into the pockets of the new owners for this. But the question is can Fernando Torres 'survive' in the English Premier League? Is he another 'Fernando' Morientes, who failed to live up to our expectation but banging in goals week in, week out once he left us for Valencia? Why don't we compete for Darren Bent instead of going after Torres? Bent is cheaper, almost half the asking price to Torres's and now we are set to lose him to Spurs.

The amount of money spent on an untried player will put Rafa in tremendous pressure to land the league title. If Torres perform then it's ok but what if he just an 'average joe'? A very good example, just look at Chelsea's megabuck superstar Andriy Shevchenko, a high profile striker in Europe but a flop in EPL. Henry cost lesser and Owen's clause is cheaper, both proven premiership goalscorers but Owen recent recovery from injury has caused Rafa to reconsider his availability. Henry rated £20million by Barcelona is far much complete player than Torres and I think Rafa would love to have him onboard if he can put his ego aside.

I know Rafa always play his cards close to his chest, but how many cards does Rafa possesses are remain to be seen? Selling players hasn't been successful so far. That's means George and Tom have to use their own pocket money to finance the purchase first, if not we'll not going to see any new player coming in at all. If we want to win the league title then we need to gamble and I mean big gamble. If Cisse was our biggest signing with £14million and wasn't able to perform, he was not signed by Rafa. Now we need Rafa to make his biggest signing in his reign and then we can judge whether he is making the right decisions or not?

Stay tune for more transfer news!


YNWA,
Red's Fury™

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Real campeones, spending spree begins!

Last Sunday, Real Madrid crowned champions of La Liga for the 30th time after four seasons in the wild. They had to comeback from a goal down to beat Mallorca 3-1 while Barcelona efforts went down the drain with 5-1 win over Gimnàstic. While Sevilla was beaten by Villarreal 0-1 at home. The three horses race to the Spanish La Liga title has come to an end now, the summer shopping spree is about to begins but there is one more game left in Spain. The Copa del Rey final between Getafe and Sevilla on 23rd June and then the transfer market is open to all clubs in the European continents on 1st July 2007.

Pressures are mounting on the two new owners of Liverpool over summer signings for the past few weeks as fans have grown anxious to see who will be coming to Anfield. Liverpool's co-owner, George Gillett has spoken to liverpoolfc.tv recently and once again assuring all of us that Liverpool Football Club are entering the second phase after securing extended deals to our current stars like Stevie G (MBE), Jamie Carragher, Jose Reina and Xabi Alonso. What does he means by 'second phase'? - bringing players in. Now we will give them the time to initiate their course before we lay down the judgement.

"We're not going to do something just to try to prove something. I can assure you that we are working on different things.

"The first part was identifying a number of our existing star players whom Rafa wanted to sign on long-term contracts.

"That was the first step and it has been done. Now we're moving on to phase two, which is bringing players in.

"For Tom and me, this really is about trying to win championships, and that takes commitment, no matter what sport.

I has read an interesting blog from kopblog.com on 'Time for Reds fans to Kop on' which the author has rally all the Reds fans to be patience and have faith in the new owners. I think he's right for the time being. We need to calm down a bit and let them do their jobs. The prospect of the takeover by George Gillett and Tom Hicks has had all of us begging for a better instalment to challenge Manchester United and Chelsea megabucks. So, I don't see why not some of us are getting impatient over some media hypes. Although, we can not totally believe what the media has been cooked up but this is really what give us the excitement over the summer holidays!

Lets discuss who do you think Rafa should sign to fill the No.9 shirt? Barcelona offered Gunners £20million for Henry and Arsene Wenger wants Eto'o as part of the deal. What happen if Barcelona refuse to include Eto'o? Should Rafa hijack it? I know Henry won't play for another premier league team but rumour from Spain saying Frank Rijkaard is stepping down as the Catalan club manager and Wenger was the replacement. If Wenger go and manage Barcelona, he won't buy player who is almost 30 year old for an over-priced £20million, he's specialize in cashing in on them not purchasing. Does the meeting between Wenger and Barcelona's club director in Paris was to discuss his position as the club's manager rather than Henry's availability? The press could again cooked up a half-baked story on this but who knows, Thierry Henry a household name in the premiership could be on his way to Anfield.

We'll have to wait and see. Just keep the faith!


YNWA,
Red's Fury™

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Reds start glory hunting at Villa Park

The EPL fixtures for 2007/08 has been released two days ago. It's about 54 days from today to kick off the new season. Put aside the frustration in the transfer market, here's something for all the Reds supporters to keep tab on. Liverpool will visit Villa Park on 11th August to kick off the Barclays Premier League campaign and hoping to collect all the three points this time as last season we only managed to drew 1-1 at Sheffield United. Since then all our away games were sucks!

In August, Reds will play four games and our first home game was scheduled against West Ham United on 15th August but was subject to be change (TBC) due to Reds involvement in the Champions League's qualification. The first team that most likely to visit Anfield in the new season is Chelsea. This time we have the opportunity to show the 2007 runner-up that we want the Premier League crown and draw first blood. To close the 20 points gaps, we need to win games against Manchester United, Chelsea and Arsenal.

The Merseyside derby falls on 20th October at Goodison Park and the blue half of Liverpool visit us on 29th March 2008. Liverpool entertain Gunners at home on 27th October, while Manchester United travel to Anfield on 15th December. On Boxing Day, the Reds will face newly promoted Derby County at Pride Park. Then, Wigan comes to Anfield on New Year's Day. Well, here goes the rest of Liverpool fixtures;

• Sat Aug 11 Aston Villa (away)
• Wed Aug 15 West Ham United (home)
• Sat Aug 18 Chelsea (home)
• Sat Aug 25 Sunderland (away)

• Sat Sep 1 Derby County (home)
• Sat Sep 15 Portsmouth (away)
• Sat Sep 22 Birmingham City (home)
• Sat Sep 29 Wigan Athletic (away)

• Sat Oct 6 Tottenham Hotspur (home)
• Sat Oct 20 Everton (away)
• Sat Oct 27 Arsenal (home)

• Sat Nov 3 Blackburn Rovers (away)
• Sat Nov 10 Fulham (home)
• Sat Nov 24 Newcastle United (away)

• Sat Dec 1 Bolton Wanderers (home)
• Sat Dec 8 Reading (away)
• Sat Dec 15 Manchester United (home)
• Sat Dec 22 Portsmouth (home)
• Wed Dec 26 Derby County (away)
• Sat Dec 29 Manchester City (away)

• Tue Jan 1 Wigan Athletic (home)
• Sat Jan 12 Middlesbrough (away)
• Sat Jan 19 Aston Villa (home)
• Tue Jan 29 West Ham United (away)

• Sat Feb 2 Sunderland (home)
• Sat Feb 9 Chelsea (away)
• Sat Feb 23 Middlesbrough (home)

• Sat Mar 1 Bolton Wanderers (away)
• Sat Mar 8 Newcastle United (home)
• Sat Mar 15 Reading (home)
• Sat Mar 22 Manchester United (away)
• Sat Mar 29 Everton (home)

• Sat Apr 5 Arsenal (away)
• Sat Apr 12 Blackburn Rovers (home)
• Sat Apr 19 Fulham (away)
• Sat Apr 26 Birmingham City (away)

• Sat May 3 Manchester City (home)
• Sun May 11 Tottenham Hotspur (away)

Will this new season marks the end of our long awaited 19th league champions? Can Rafa deliver us the cup that we've been missing since 1990?

YNWA,
Red's Fury™

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No money, no talk

Now I'm very pissed! It's already been three weeks since the talk on signing at least one top class player for Liverpool and none of them has show up yet. The question of 'how much we have for transfer budget this summer?' still hasn't been answered by the American owners. Rafa failed to launch a bid on the likes of Samuel Eto'o (£35million), David Villa, Carlos Tevez (£30million), Fernando Torres (£15million), Simao Sabrosa (£11million), Florent Malouda (£17million) and Darrent Bent (£16million) was not due to his inconsistency in the transfer market. It was the owners who has not given the full funding to Rafa for the players he want to bring onboard. Show us the damn money!

We've already missed out on a few targets to rival clubs in the continent such as Daniel Alves to Real Madrid and Gabriel Milito to Juventus. Samuel Eto'o too was out of our range with a hefty price tag. Now David Villa wants to stay with Valencia cos he is under contract until June 2013 and has a buy-out-clause of £100million. £100million! That's insane! While for Carlos Tevez, his desire to leave the Premiership outfit has prompted Inter Milan to offer £34million to West Ham and knocked us and a bunch of premier league suitors out of the race for his signature.

The list of transfer targets are getting shorter. Lyon won't release Malouda unless we met the revised transfer fee from £8million to £17million. This is ridiculous, £17million for a left-winger. Lyon chairman Jean-Michel Aulas has immensely raised the transfer fee just because Chelsea has shown interest on Malouda and want to have a bite on Abramovich's pie. Now Rafa was forced to look for other option elsewhere and long-term target, Simao Sabrosa was his next move. However, Benfica's club president Luis Filipe Vieira will only consider an “incredible offer” as they don’t wish to sell him. There goes our left and right wingers. No money, no talk as my header suggest was rightfully justify our summer transfer transactions.

A report from Charlton said that West Ham has prepare to offer an £18million deal for Darren Bent. But Bent wasn't the actual target we need. We need a strong and big striker and Atletico Madrid's Fernando Torres was up for sales in the summer. Atletico failed to qualify for UEFA Cup means they are expecting to lose Torres and the Premier League big guns will keep an eye on him. Can we compete with Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester United? This is our last chance to sign a new striker. The Red Devils has splashed around £50million on new players, Chelsea was successful in signing a player on free transfer, while Gunners signed a young goalkeeper and we only have Andriy Voronin, Lucas Leiva and two Hungarian youngsters. Where are the star players that Gillett and Hicks has promised to buy?

The players named in my poll (Thierry Henry, Samuel Eto'o, David Villa, Darren Bent and Michael Owen) are disappearing one by one except Michael Owen. While, Thierry Henry are unlikely to join us (but we are really love to have him onboard!). Are little MO our only last resorts for a new striker? But Rafa is not very keen on Owen swoop just yet. We are not only losing summer transfer targets, if this situation prolong, Rafael Benitez will says "Adios amigos".



YNWA,
Red's Fury™

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Lets snub Eto'o for Henry

Forget about Samuel Eto'o, he's not coming to Anfield. We don't know how much the American owners are willing to splash their cash in the transfer market and Rafa has stressed that he can't bid for a world class player when he don't know how much he could spend? Milan is officially launch their bid for the Cameroonian international. So, end of the story.

But the good news is Thierry Henry still hasn't given Arsenal the assurance that he'll stay with the Gunners next season. The rifts in the Arsenal's board has caused Henry to re-think his future and the departure of his close friend, vice-chairman David Dein also hinted that the relationship between him and the club has came to a standstill. This rumour spread rapidly in Liverpool recently and we would very much appreciate it if Henry do switch to the red of Merseyside. Even the betting giant William Hill has reduced the odds for Henry to leave Arsenal in the summer from 10/1 to 3/1. Hill's spokesman Graham Sharpe said;

'Thierry keeps saying he is happy where he is but we have been offering odds against him staying at Arsenal for some time now - and there are very few takers.'

My poll "Who would you sign?" shown that Thierry Henry is the favorite and second by Michael Owen. Rumours suggested that Djibril Cisse will be use as a bargaining chip to lure Henry to Anfield. I think it's a good deal for us and Arsenal although the odds are staked against us. We all know what Henry can do in the Premiership and he is a world's top class striker.

Come to Anfield, Thierry and we will worship you as we worshiped Robbie 'GOD' Fowler. What do you think?

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