Man City shock Liverpool with £13m bid for Dane as Real and Barca wait in the wings
Liverpool now face a major fight to keep the 27-year-old after he told Anfield chief Brendan Rodgers that he wants out
Manchester City have rocked Liverpool with a £13million bid for defender Daniel Agger.
Liverpool now face a major fight to keep Agger, 27, with Real Madrid and Barcelona also interested.
The Premier League champions lodged their bid with Liverpool last week and had it rejected.
But Agger has already told Anfield chief Brendan Rodgers that he wants out.
The Danish centre-back is expected to confirm within the next two weeks whether he will opt for the Emirates or Spain but City are ready to up their bid to keep him in the Premier League.
The player still set to be sacrificed by City to accommodate the Agger is Kolo Toure.
The Ivory Coast star has a year left on his contract and, after being frozen out by Mancini last season, has been a target for Turkish club Bursaspor and Saudi Arabian club Al Hilal - but Barcelona are also now keen on the former Arsenal man.
But City have not yet found a taker willing to pay a transfer fee on top of his £120,000-a-week wages, even though the Ivory Cost defender is willing to take a pay cut.
To complicate matters, Vincent Kompany's injury yesterday - the Blues skipper flew home from their Malaysia tour - means the champions are now loathe to allow Toure to leave as his departure would rob them of experienced cover.
If City DO sign Agger, they then face paying Toure around £6million over the next 12 months in wages if he is not sold or included in their 25-man squad for the Premier League and the Champions League. Mirror
Manchester United gazumped by Manchester City with Robin van Persie bid
Roberto Mancini is in the news this morning after lengthy quotes about how he needs several new players to have a good chance of retaining the Premier League title and making a challenge for the Champions League.
The Manchester City manager is not content with the squad he has and believes he was hit hard by injuries last season, despite the Injury League showing that Manchester City suffered less injury setbacks than any other side in the Premier League.
Mancini also complained that City are having to pay up to £10m more for players because clubs want to get as much as they can but with a recent history of satisfying those demands and after going public with a need to bring in so many players, the club doesn't help itself.
One of the targets for this season is Robin van Persie and according to The Mirror Manchester City have put in a bigger bid than Manchester United in an effort to push themselves to the front of the queue. The newspaper say that Ferguson's side offered £12m whereas Mancini went in with £15m, neither of which satisfy Arsenal's demands at this stage.
Manchester United fans haven't been overly enthused by the prospect of signing Robin van Persie and neither have City supporters, both sets think their clubs would do well to strengthen elsewhere. However, neither will want to lose out to the other if it comes down to a straight Manchester battle for the Arsenal man.SPORT WITNESS
What can Platt still do?
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Concern for City as captain Kompany leaves tour early with calf injury
Manchester City captain Vincent Kompany has flown home early from the club's tour of the Far East after suffering a calf injury in the win over Arsenal on Friday night.
The Belgian international struggled with a calf problem towards the end of last season and pulled up in the second half of City's tour match against the Gunners in Beijing's Birds Nest Stadium.
Now Sportsmail can reveal that Kompany has flown back to England for treatment today after manager Roberto Mancini decided he would not be fit enough to face a Malaysian XI here in Kuala Lumpur tomorrow night.
City sources have stressed that there is no long-term concern over Kompany's fitness but that they want to make sure he is fit for the start of the season. Mail Reporter
The Champions eye ’5 more’ signings!
Manchester City boss Roberto Mancini has revealed that he could make as many as five additions to the newly crowned champions and has admitted that he will be carrying out his summer transfer business with one eye on the future. Mancini accepts that continuous improvement is the target for City, and that may mean making some small adjustments to an incredibly talented playing staff that is already one of the strongest squads around.
Speaking to Sky Sports News, Mancini said ;
“We are a young team because we have played together for only two years
We won after 50 years. We need to work harder than last year and we need to buy the players that will help the team to improve.
We don’t need big changes. We don’t need 10 players like maybe two or three years ago.
But we need three or four or five players and in these five players will be young guys for the future because it is important to put young players in the squad and make them as good as the players that we have.”
One of those ’5′ targets is thought to be Liverpool’s Danish central defender Daniel Agger. It has been reported tonight that Agger has told Liverpool he wishes to leave the club and some quarters have reported that City have made a £13 million pound bid for the defender who has two years left on his contract at Anfield.
Of the other targets, Arsenal’s Robin Van Persie still has not revealed which club he would like to join. Mancini is a fan of Van Persie but faces competition from rivals Manchester United and Italian Giants Juventus for the dutchman’s signature.World Football
Gone for nothing? Emmanuel Adebayor could leave Man City for free
Adebayor's potential move to Spurs collapsing over terms, leaves City facing a £12m loss on striker
Manchester City are facing the prospect of handing Emmanuel Adebayor a free transfer.
And that would take the amount of talent written off by boss Roberto Mancini towards £90million.
The Blues are furious that, after agreeing a cut-price £6m deal with Tottenham for a player they valued at £12m, the move is collapsing over personal terms.
City were desperate to save Adebayor’s £170,000-a-week wages – and remove a major obstacle stopping them making a £20m raid for Arsenal’s Robin van Persie.
Adebayor has been a hit at Spurs, but Man City are worried about selling him to a potential rival
The champions told chairman Daniel Levy that they would accept a cut-price fee of £6m to help Spurs offer Adebayor a package close to the wages he earns at the Etihad.
City feel Levy has now backtracked – a move forcing them to examine the prospect of either allowing the former Arsenal hit-man to leave for free or giving him a pay-off to compensate him for the money he will lose on the final two years of his contract.
A City insider said: “It was felt there was two ways to handle Adebayor. Either we could ask for a fee in excess of £10m knowing we would have to spend perhaps half of that compensating the player for lost earnings.
“Or, by asking £6m, the buying club would be able to offer wages acceptable to Adebayor.
“Tottenham knew that was our intention. Now they want us to accept the lower fee and pay Adebayor off.
“Basically they want a player who scored the goals that took them to fourth place in the Premier League last season for nothing.”
Sunday Mirror Sport can reveal that signing Van Persie will remain an impossible dream while Adebayor stays.
Mancini has issued a thinly-veiled attack on the failure of City’s football administrator Brian Marwood to land his No.1 target.
But even if City doubled their initial £15m offer to tempt the Gunners, Van Persie will not join the same club as Adebayor.
The Dutchman still hasn’t forgiven his former Emirates team-mate for the stamp which left him nursing a head wound and earned Adebayor a three-match ban for violent conduct when City beat Arsenal 4-2 in an explosive encounter in September 2009.
Like City, Manchester United and Juventus will not meet Arsenal’s £30m valuation.
But Adebayor’s continuing presence at the Etihad is a stumbling block for City.
Mancini is unhappy that Marwood has been unable to offload both Adebayor and Roque Santa Cruz. But City have already lost more than £45m of the £431m they have spent in transfer fees since Sheikh Mansour took over the club in August 2008.
They have also lost another fortune subsidising wages to compensate for the loss of earnings once a player leaves the club, either on loan or permanently.
Santa Cruz, a £17.5m buy from Blackburn, is available for free but clubs are reluctant to match the £90,000-a-week wages he will earn in the final year of his contract.
If he and Adebayor leave for free, that will wipe another £42.5m off the players Sheikh Mansour has bought.
Kolo Toure, a £16m buy from Arsenal, can go for £5m. And £16m Nigel de Jong will leave for free when his contract runs out next year. Robinho, a £32m marquee signing who arrived when the Abu Dhabi United Group took over, was sold to AC Milan for £15m.
Craig Bellamy joined Liverpool on a free after costing £14m, while £12m Wayne Bridge will have his £90,000-a-week pay subsidised while on loan at Brighton.
Keeper Shay Given joined Aston Villa for half of the £6m he cost from Newcastle.
But Jerome Boateng was sold for a profit. He cost £10.5m from Hamburg but moved to Bayern Munich for £12.4m.
Usual snippets of bollox
Robin van Persie is demanding the same wages as Wayne Rooney, thought to be around £220,000 per week, before he agrees to join Manchester United. Express
Rivals Manchester City are not prepared to match that, however, and are thought to have limited their offer to £150,000 per week. Mirror
The agent who orchestrated the move to take striker Emmanuel Adebayor from Arsenal to Manchester City believes the 28-year-old is "unlikely" to move to Tottenham. talkShite
Kolo Toure admits it will be difficult for Manchester City to defend their Premier League crown, but insists they are up to the task.
Toure spoke to Sky Sports NewsHD as City continue their pre-season tour of the Far East.
Having won the title with Arsenal in 2004, he was unable to help them win the league the following year, so the Ivorian knows the task that awaits Roberto Mancini's men.
"It will be difficult defending because every team will come down and look to beat us," he told Sky Sports NewsHD.
"But when you're champion you need to behave like a champion and take it game by game.
"The confidence is here, everyone now just wants to win and when you win once you want to win every time and City now wants to win every season.
"We know how to win and now we have to work hard and give 100 per cent every game, the Premier League is the hardest in the world and five or six clubs could be champion and for us we will just focus on us and do our best." Sporting Life
Manchester City v Southampton - Sunday 19 August 2012
Tickets are now sold out for the The Blues’ opening home Premier League game against Southampton on 19 August.
Hospitality is still available for this game. Supporters wishing to make enquiries should telephone 0161 444 1894 (option 1, option 2) or email: sales@mcfc.co.uk.
Man City boss Mancini warns Balotelli: Don't slip back into your bad old ways this season
"Hopefully he can understand that, if he improves his behaviour, he can be better at his job,' says the striker's club boss
Roberto Mancini has called on Mario Balotelli to build on his impressive Euro 2012 displays next season and prove he is a changed man.
Balotelli played with discipline and maturity on Italy's march to the Euro 2012, scoring twice before they were humbled 4-0 by Spain in the final.
It was a far cry from the Balotelli of last season who was mired in controversy on and off the pitch for Manchester City, earning two red cards and missing 11 games through suspension.
But City boss Mancini said there were signs at Euro 2012 that Balotelli was growing up and he urged his fellow Italian not to be a liability any more by lapsing into his bad old ways.
"I think that Mario did well in the Euros," said Mancini, speaking from City's Kuala Lumpur hotel on the club's pre-season tour of the Far East.
"I think he played well and I hope those performances for Italy can help him to improve.
"Mario is one of the best strikers in Italy because we don't have, at the moment, another striker like him.
"I think that every time he plays well, like he did at the Euros, it's important for him because it can help him with his behaviour.
"Then hopefully he can understand that, if he improves his behaviour, he can be better at his job.
"With the national team he is an important player, but for us also he's also an important player.
"We spent a lot of money on him, he's young and I think he can have a big future at Manchester City.
"It all depends on him, if he continues [to mature] in this way. He has everything.
"If he understands he can't do what he did last season against Arsenal and Tottenham [sent off in both games] and thinks only to play football, he can do really well."
Although Balotelli thrived on being Italy's main striker at Euro 2012, Mancini said the 21-year-old's versatility meant he may not always play in his favoured role for City.
"Mario is lucky because he is young and with his body and his attitude, he can play as a forward or like a winger," said Mancini.
"So I think he can play in every position. Maybe, for me though, he is better like a first striker.
"He's played in that position a lot of times. Sometimes we play with him in front and Yaya Toure behind, like we did last season.
"With Sergio Aguero it's different, because he likes to play nearer the penalty box. We have four strikers and, of these four strikers, only Mario can play wide."
Bridge ready for more
Wayne Bridge is hungry for more action after his first run out for Albion.
But boss Gus Poyet has revealed he might hold him back in readiness for two tests against Premier League opponents.
Bridge played about an hour of Saturday’s 0-0 friendly draw with Spanish second division side Cordoba on the Costa del Sol.
He felt no reaction to the groin problem which had delayed his first Seagulls outing by a fortnight.
But Poyet will not decide until the squad report back tomorrow whether he will field the Manchester City and former England defender at Worthing on Wednesday.
Poyet said: “Wayne was all right. He wanted to play more. He was desperate top play but what he had on Saturday was enough.
"It’s just about him not feeling that pain during that game and on Saturday he didn’t feel it which is good We will talk with the medical department and see what is next for him.”
SNUB COUNT: 327
Owen Hargreaves is training with QPR following his release by Manchester City.
The 31-year-old midfielder, who has won 42 England caps, has been plagued by injuries since joining Manchester United for around £17million from Bayern Munich in 2007.
Rangers boss Mark Hughes said: “Owen is training with the group. There is no obligation for either party.
“He is keen to retain his fitness, and we are more than happy to help him by allowing him to train with us and use our facility at Harlington.”
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[/spoiler]OTHER BOLLOX
Still hurting: Paul Scholes opens up on how seeing Kompany lift the league trophy pains him
Manchester United legend describes how he still can't watch the last day of the seasona and see arch-rivals Man City winning the Premier League
Even now, more than two months after Manchester City became champions, Paul Scholes still can’t bring himself to watch Vincent Kompany lifting the Premier League trophy.
NSFPS (Not Safe For Paul Scholes)
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He has seen the injury-time strike by Sergio Aguero that so dramatically ripped the title from Manchester United’s grasp on goal difference in the final seconds of an epic season. But for someone like Scholes, who was born on the red side of a rivalry that splits Manchester, that’s about all he can take.
Aguero wheeling away to celebrate the goal that defeated QPR at an ecstatic Etihad – and left United beaten and broken despite their own victory at Sunderland – is an image Scholes and his team-mates will carry with them into the new campaign.
And so too is the bitter acknowledgement that, despite United’s failure to defend an eight-point lead in the final six games of the season, City got exactly what they deserved.
Scholes conceded: “You always say the best team wins the league – and City were the best team last year.
“The football they played for most of the season was fantastic. As much as I don’t want to admit it, they were good to watch and probably played the best football.
“So from that aspect, they were the best team and deserved to win it. They have raised the bar and it’s up to us to now kick on and do even better than they did. I haven’t seen all of what happened at City on the final day, although I have seen little bits of them celebrating when Aguero scored.
“I haven’t even seen them lifting the trophy.
“But it’s always a motivating factor when you lose the league – and perhaps we will be motivated even more after what happened.
“It isn’t nice when you see another team winning the title on the last day of the season. You have that picture in your head of them celebrating and you don’t want it to happen again.”
At one point City had seemed certain to turn the race for the title into a procession – before Scholes answered a New Year plea from Alex Ferguson to come out of retirement.
His first game back saw Scholes come off the bench to help United end the Blues’ defence of the FA Cup, before 11 wins and a draw in their next 12 games seemed to make a 20th title a formality.
But defeats at Wigan and City, either side of a 4-4 home draw with Everton, opened the door once more for Roberto Mancini’s City men.
At the age of 37, Scholes has seen most things, but he admitted: “I still don’t really understand what happened.
“We should have won the league, and we didn’t. In the end, we failed. To be in the position we were, eight points clear with six games to go, well... it’s not like us.”
There’s no doubt what Scholes will be aiming for this season.
“The Premier League is always the one you want to win first,” he added. “To be the champions of your own country is always the main aim. We have been lucky enough to do that a few times.
“Now we’re hoping there is another title for us at the end of next season.
Newcastle could be back as favourites to sign Liverpool striker Andy Carroll after the 23-year-old revealed he would only leave Anfield to play European football. talkShyte
But Newcastle will only move for their former striker if the £7m escape clause is triggered in the contract of Demba Ba, 27. Sunday Mirror
Southampton are thought to have enquired about bringing Arsenal's Theo Walcott back to St Mary's. Sunday Mirror
Meanwhile, the Gunners expect to complete the £15m transfer of Malaga midfielder Santi Cazorla, 27, by Tuesday. Daily Mail
West Brom boss Steve Clarke has confirmed that striker Shane Long, 25, is not for sale after reported interest from Reading. Birmingham Mail
Fulham are ready to make a bid for Arsenal's Russian international Andrey Arshavin, 31, who is believed to want to remain in London.
Manchester United will assess Celtic midfielder Victor Wanyama during the Champions League qualifiers, while the Scottish champions are also aware of interest from Fulham, Liverpool, Queens Park Rangers and Stoke City. Sunday Mail
Tottenham boss Andre Villas-Boas is furious with Liverpool midfielder Charlie Adam after he injured Gareth Bale again during the goalless friendly in America. Daily Telegraph
Arsenal midfielder Jack Wilshere is unlikely to return to first-team action until October at the earliest as he continues his lengthy recuperation from knee and ankle problems. Sun
Former Spurs skipper Ledley King admits he cried when he learned his career was over because of injury and reveals he had injury problems since his first game for Spurs at Derby in 1999. Sun
Manchester United are monitoring the situation of Chelsea full-back Ashley Cole after telling Everton they will not increase their £12m offer for Leighton Baines. Metro
Tottenham face a battle to sign Lyon keeper Hugo Lloris with the French club insisting they will not let him leave unless he asks for a transfer. talkSHITE
Chelsea chief executive Ron Gourlay says the club have not finished spending yet. Chelsea have paid £65m for new players this summer and could also pay £32m for Napoli striker Edison Cavani, £7m for Wigan's Victor Moses and £8m for Marseille defender Cesar Azpilicueta. Daily Express
Sunderland have put in a £12m bid for Wolves striker Steve Fletcher, who the Midlands club are believed to value at £15m. Daily Mail
Arsenal could add to the signings of Theo Walcott and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain from Southampton as they have targeted the south coast club's 17-year-old full-back Luke Shaw. Daily Mirror
Tottenham could resurrect an interest in former Chelsea defender Ricardo Carvalho after he was told he can leave Real Madrid. The Times
Aston Villa are on the trail of £6m-rated Ipswich defender Aaron Cresswell and may sell James Collins, who is on the radar of Sunderland and West Ham United. Wolverhampton Express & Star
Queens Park Rangers will make bids for Arsenal midfielder Andrey Arshavin and Tottenham striker Jermain Defoe this summer. caughtoffside.com
Liverpool boss Brendan Rodgers says that Andy Carroll can "fit into how I want to play" and that the striker is "happy" to stay with the Reds. talkSHITE
Lukas Podolski and Olivier Giroud will not be fit to start the season for Arsenal after the new arrivals did not accompany the club on their tour of Asia. The Sun
Manchester United's coach driver became an instant hero among the playing squad after talking his way out of a sticky situation with Shanghai police. Metro
more soon ....
