Aston Villa striker Darren Bent has admitted he is honoured to be handed the No.19 shirt at Villa Park, the shirt previously worn by Stiliyan Petrov.
The number 19 shirt was retired for a season after the former Villa captain was diagnosed with leukemia.
However Bent has now been issued the number after the Bulgarian ace returned to fitness following his battle with the blood disease.
The striker said: “Obviously No.19 carries a big significance because of Stiliyan. It’s a real honour to wear it.
“It’s a fantastic feeling. I will try and do the shirt proud and do as well as I can in it.
“What a great player Stiliyan was – he’s a top bloke too. He was superb – a brilliant midfielder and a real leader in that dressing room.
“It was awful to see what he had to go through and it was terrible to see his career cut short but he won the real battle.
“He’s still around the place. I see him at the training ground quite regularly. We still speak on the phone regularly.
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“He told me to look after the shirt – and I promised him I would.”
Barcelona’s Director of Football Adoni Zubizarreta has dismissed claims that the Spanish giants will pick up an easy win against Celtic in tomorrow night’s Champions League clash.
The Scottish champions have been the surprise team in Champions League Group G, lying in second place with four points following an away win against Spartak Moscow and a draw against Benfica.
Celtic also put in a good performance against Tito Vilanova’s men at the Nou Camp last month, but came away empty handed as Jordi Alba scored a late winner in stoppage time to end the match 2-1.
Zubizarreta has warned Barcelona fans that facing the Glasgow club will be even harder now that they have the home advantage when they visit Celtic Park tomorrow.
“We won with a last minute goal at the Camp Nou. It won’t be easy to win. Their fans get right behind them and their style of play is tough for us to deal with,” he told reporters before boarding the plane to Scotland.
Barcelona are now five points clear at the top of Group G, but Zubizarreta insists the Spanish club will be looking for the win against Celtic to qualify for the knock-out stages as soon as possible.
“We want to top our group to guarantee a good draw in the next round. We’ll try and do that as quickly as we can”.
In La Liga, Barcelona have made a record-breaking start to their domestic campaign with 28 points from ten games, however Zubizarreta’s only concern is winning back the league title after finishing in second place last season.
“It’s great, but we aren’t trying to get records at this stage of the season – what we want is to ensure we get to April still in the fight for titles,” he added.
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Everton are reportedly targeting Middlesbrough’s Ben Gibson as a replacement for Ramiro Funes Mori, but Marco Silva would be better served targeting Chelsea defender Kurt Zouma instead.
What’s the story, then?
The Northern Echo has reported that Everton are ready to target Middlesbrough defender Ben Gibson.
The report states that the Toffees are willing to part with two players in order to beat Southampton to the signing of the Englishman. The 25-year-old impressed in his single season in the Premier League and was reportedly a target for Manchester City, according to The Sun.
The Northern Echo report states that Everton would be willing to part with Mohamed Besic and Ramiro Funes Mori in order to get the deal over the line. Funes Mori has been confirmed as a Villareal player, so Marco Silva will be keen to get a deal for the defender done.
Gibson has been a stalwart in defence under Tony Pulis, playing 46 times in the Championship last season, and largely improved in every area of his game over the course of the season.
Whilst Gibson has improved, he has minimal Premier League experience and Zouma would provide a younger, better option for the Portuguese manager.
Since Zouma’s arrival at Chelsea he has made 81 Premier League appearances in his four seasons. He spent last season on loan at Stoke City, playing 37 times for the Potters.
Why Kurt Zouma?
Despite Stoke City’s relegation to the Championship, Zouma was largely heralded as one of the players who could hold his head high.
Stoke played some abysmal football last season, and Zouma was let down by the experienced players around him.
He is a classic defender who is not afraid to boot the ball to safety yet, at 23-years-old, has the potential to be moulded into the centre-back that Marco Silva desires for his Everton defence.
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Everton were extremely leaky at the back last season, conceding 58 goals in a torrid season.
Zouma, who is valued at £13.5m by transfermarkt.com, showed in his earlier years at Chelsea that he has the ability to go from strength-to-strength if he is given the correct coach, and working with the likes of Phil Jagielka and Michael Keane can only help in the improvement of personal performances for the Frenchman.
[brid autoplay=”true” video=”255567″ player=”12034″ title=”Watch Five England results that highlight Panama’s threat”]
Southampton striker Charlie Austin has told Sky Sports News that he is around five weeks away from fitness.
What’s the update?
The 28-year-old has been on the sidelines since the end of December with a hamstring injury.
Prior to the blow, the forward was in positive form, scoring five goals in seven games for the Saints.
During his absence, Mauricio Pellegrino’s side have struggled to impress in front of goal, and they have secured victory in just one of their eight league matches since Austin got injured.
While speaking to Sky Sports News, the former Queens Park Rangers striker claimed that he is edging towards fitness, but is still expected to be out of action for the next five weeks.
Do Southampton miss him?
There is no denying that the coastal club have been in need of firepower up front.
Shane Long has been misfiring, while Manolo Gabbiadini has also had a slump.
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Guido Carrillo was brought into the team in the January transfer window to provide some extra options up front, but he is taking time to find his feet.
As it stands, Southampton are one point from safety in the Premier League, and with Austin not due back until the end of March, the club cannot afford to wait for him to save them.
Arsene Wenger’s relaxed, gregarious character and the setting of Brazil’s beaches were deceptive.
Here was the Arsenal manager in out-of-office mode, seemingly happy to allow domestic rival clubs to bolster their squads unchallenged and create an impression that this was the same old song Arsenal fans had forced to listen to for the best part of the last decade.
But we’re now 18 days on from Alexis Sanchez’s signing at Arsenal. It didn’t come as a nervy deadline day deal like high-profile signings of the past, nor can it be said that the club were lucky to stumble upon the Chilean’s availability as, reportedly, they did with Mesut Ozil a year ago.
It’s long been known that Alexis would move on from Barcelona. Luis Suarez’s signing added to that. But in Alexis, Arsenal were targeting a player not too dissimilar in playing style to that of Barcelona’s newly-signed Uruguayan forward, a player Wenger openly chased during last summer’s transfer period. There’s far too much at play here for Alexis’ signing in north London to be a spur of the moment deal.
And the club haven’t sat back on that deal either. They’ve ridden the wave of optimism and renewed faith by signing Mathieu Debuchy and David Ospina, and with Calum Chambers set to be announced soon.
These aren’t just middle-of-the-road additions, as has been described of the club’s signings in the past. Debuchy, able to keep Bacary Sagna out of the France team and with the requisite Premier League experience to comfortably replace Sagna, is a good piece of business; Ospina had a fantastic World Cup with Colombia, and landing the former Nice goalkeeper for £3.2m is a bargain in the modern market; while Chambers is a highly-rated prospect for the future that comes with the bonus of having 21 Premier League appearances under his belt.
WANT MORE? >> Arsenal transfer news | Latest transfer news
All of that and July isn’t over.
Wenger’s ‘stubbornness’ may not hold as much water now as it did in the past. There were conflicting stories coming out of the club as to the manager’s financial ability in the market: he was said to have the resources available to him to land whichever player he deemed necessary for the progress of the team, while Wenger himself maintained that a watchful eye and great restraint had to be held with regards to the club’s budget. In 2012, the manager stated the club needed to make £15-20m each summer as a means to help pay off the debts.
Evidently what we’re seeing now is that if the money is there, Wenger will spend.
In 2009, the club had come off a humbling season in which they’d fallen well short of the performances put together in the 2007-08 season. Quality signings were needed in multiple areas of the pitch, but only Thomas Vermaelen arrived from Ajax for £10.5m. The following summer, Laurent Koscielny was the club’s biggest signing, arriving from FC Lorient for £10m and joined by Sebastien Squillaci, £5m from Sevilla, and Marouane Chamakh, free from Bordeaux.
It wasn’t a perverse act on the manager’s part, although it was easy to be engulfed by the feeling at the time, such was the growing frustration among the support. It’s no coincidence that those deals happened in a period where the club were mired in financial limitations due to the new stadium, and much higher quality signings like Ozil and Alexis have taken place either on the brink of new sponsorship deals or on the dawn of those announcements.
WANT MORE? >> Arsenal transfer news | Latest transfer news
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Let’s not drift too far away and into a state of utmost romanticism. Wenger still likes to do things his way and he does have his shortcomings. Persistent injuries, generally of the same type, to almost all members of the squad, past and present, are no accident. Nor are the heavy defeats.
But on the transfer front, the proof is there for us to see: Wenger will spend if he has the means. There’s a new confidence about the way the club have gone about their business thus far, akin to that of a film director who put together his first film on a budget of £25,000, only to be given licence over a £25m budget later in his career. It’s not really profligacy, and there’s no harm in throwing cash around if it’ll make the project better.
There’s still a month a change left of this transfer window. But Wenger is quickly laying to rest the wide-held belief that Arsenal’s frustrations in the market have been all of his own making.
Theo Walcott is a major doubt for England’s crucial trip to Poland on Tuesday after he was involved in a ‘fierce’ challenge during Friday night’s 5-0 World Cup qualifier victory against San Marino.
England manager Roy Hodgson told BBC Sport that the Arsenal winger will stay overnight in hospital after he was substituted with a chest injury following a nasty collision with goalkeeper Aldo Simoncini.
Hodgson said: “We have to find out the extent of his injury but he will be in hospital overnight and he will be having a scan.
“It is a chest injury. It didn’t look good and until such time as they have X-rayed it and scanned it I really don’t know.”
England failed to excel in front of a virtually sold-out Wembley against the defensive minded minnows, who are ranked 207th in the world, before Wayne Rooney made the vital breakthrough thanks to sweetly struck penalty after 35 minutes of frustration.
His club and country partner in crime Danny Welbeck notched the second just two minutes later and the Manchester United pairing doubled the lead in the second half before Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain’s first England goal added some much needed gloss to the scoreline.
Rooney’s double were his 30th and 31st goals for the country taking him past Nat Lofthouse, Tom Finney and Alan Shearer in England’s all-time list of goalscorers
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Hodgson added: “If I described the challenge as reckless I would be being kind. It was a very fierce challenge.
“I don’t believe there was any malice. But it put a dampener on the evening.”
The Arsenal fans in the Transfer Tavern were disappointed to hear the recent news that Jack Wilshere will depart the club this summer after spending almost the entirety of his footballing career with the Gunners.
Following months of speculation, Wilshere finally arrived at a decision on his future and publicly revealed that he will depart when his contract expires at the end of the month. Wilshere’s decision will further transform the new-look Arsenal side as the club move into a post-Wenger era, but a recent report from the Daily Mirror suggests that Unai Emery wants another club veteran, namely Aaron Ramsey (valued at £40.5 million by Transfermarkt), to commit his future to the club.
The report claims that Emery is keen on extending Ramsey’s current deal which expires in the summer of 2019 and talks are ongoing between player and club.
The Wales international has divided the Arsenal supporters in recent years, but his return to form last season in which he scored 11 goals and provided 12 assists in all-competitions was more than enough to convince them that he has a huge part to play in the club’s future under Emery.
Landlord’s verdict
Our landlord believes that agreeing fresh terms with Ramsey is one of the most important, if not the most important task Emery has on his hands this summer.
As the club move into a new era it’s important that a handful of the stalwarts of the Wenger era remain in North London to ensure the transition period is both smooth and successful.
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With just 1 year remaining on his current deal, it’s vital that Arsenal extend Ramsey’s contract this summer to avoid any distractions concerning his future when the season gets underway in August.
According to his latest set of Premier League predictions via Bet Victor, former Manchester United and Newcastle United striker Michael Owen is backing Red Devils boss Jose Mourinho to end his St James’ Park hoodoo when the two teams meet on Sunday, with the help of midfielder Paul Pogba.
While the Portuguese boss is already considered to be one of the best managers to ever grace the Premier League since its inauguration in 1992, he has failed to win a league match on Tyneside in any of his six attempts – with all of those coming when he was at Chelsea.
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The 55-year-old will be looking to put that right this weekend as he looks to try and keep the pressure up on leaders Manchester City and cement second place for his team, and he will be confident of doing so given that the Magpies are just one point above the relegation zone, and have the worst home record in the Premier League with just 13 points taken and 11 goals scored in 13 matches on their own patch this term.
Owen told Bet Victor: “The Magpies are without a win in their last eight PL home games but, surprisingly, Jose Mourinho has never won a league game at St James’ Park in six previous attempts. Paul Pogba was left out of the United side against Huddersfield at Old Trafford last weekend but I expect the Frenchman to be back in the starting XI and a winning side at the weekend.”
United have won more Premier League away games at St James’ (12) than they have at any other club.
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Even though they trail the Premier League’s summit by six points and have been in underwhelming for of late, Manchester City’s title rivals have been talking up their credentials. And it’s little wonder why, with the Sky Blues possessing, arguably, the best squad and first XI in the league. Wherever you look, the Etihad Stadium side have depth, strength and passion, and their win at Hull may not have been classy, but it did illustrate why they are the dominant force. These three points back up our statement…
They can win ugly
They say winning when you don’t play well wins titles and illustrates strength, and that is just what City did. After Kompany was sent off it looked like the juggernauts may struggle, but they dug in and secured three points with a numerical disadvantage.
https://vine.co/v/Mb0EQan011K/embed/simple
Individual brilliance
Down to 10 men, City needed something special to get their afternoon back on track. Then right on cue, David Silva stepped up with a wonderful curling effort. https://vine.co/v/Mb0VegLAhAe/embed/simple
Goal-scorers
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Even with Sergio Aguero and Alvaro Negredo not featuring, City can still call upon a top class striker in Edin Dzeko. The Bosnian may not have hit the heights expected of him at the Etihad Stadium, but he can find the net when needed. https://vine.co/v/MbEDmn6JwFD/embed/simple
Stoke City defender Steven N’Zonzi hopes he can replicate his own previous success by going to Old Trafford and claiming three points with his new side.
N’Zonzi was part of an un-fancied Blackburn team that went to Old Trafford last season that won 3-2 and is hopeful that he can draw on his own experience, when Stoke travel to Manchester on Saturday.
“It was an absolute incredible result, and an incredible feeling when you walk off the pitch at Old Trafford having won, the midfielder told the Stoke City website.
“They are without doubt one of the biggest, if not the biggest clubs in the world, and so to go there and be able to say that you won the game is pretty amazing, so it is a game that I will always remember,” N’Zonzi said.
The Frenchman has taken enough encouragement from performances against the likes of Liverpool and Manchester City to believe his side can put on another impressive showing at the Theatre of Dreams.
“It is one game, and people may not give us much chance on Saturday, but similarly nobody gave Blackburn a chance when we went there last season, and look what happened.
“We have performed well this season and picked up points from games where people may not have thought we would get anything. We are moving in the right direction and I am really enjoying being a part of it all.”
Tony Pulis’ side have managed five draws out of their opening seven games this season and N’Zonzi admits he would have liked to see some of those draws turn into wins, but still remains happy with the way the season has gone.
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“Obviously we want to get more wins, that is what football is all about, but they will come. Performances have been good and we can take a lot of positives from the start we have made,” he added.