The last day of the transfer window was properly one of the most eventful EVER!!
The biggest deal of the day (and biggest shock) was not as expected the Berbatov deal to United. More of that in a bit. Back to Berbatov……
There was all sorts of confusion as to what was actually happening with apparently Spurs not agreeing for United to speak to him and apparently City bidding for him (more of that later). Anyway, United ended up signing Berbatov just before the midnight deadline. It wasnt made official until about 1am. In the end he was signed for £30.75m. He will get the number 9 shirt. He has said its not all about money and said “If I want to play for the money, I would accept the Manchester City offer or Chelsea”. “The red shirt is the really big thing for me. I want to play for the biggest club in the world.” Going in the other direction is striker Fraizer Campbell on a loan deal for the rest of the season. I am pleased with this as I think he has a United future.
Right, now to the biggest shock of the deal and the one everyone is talking about. Manchester City signed Robinho, Yep, thats right. The Brazillian “superstar” and the “next Pele” has signed for Manchester City. This all came about because City were bought by consortium Abu Dhabi United Group. They are in some way backed by the Abu Dhabi royal family. Apparently they are 10 times richer than Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich. Manchester City ended up breaking the British transfer record. They signed Robinho for £32.5m and are apparently paying him £4m a year. I am just glad hes not going to Chelsea!!! I would love to have seen Peter Kenyon’s face when he found out!!! LOL. Robinho has wanted to leave Real Madrid for awhile and was expecting to be signed by Chelsea. However Real Madrid didnt want to sell him to Chelsea because they will be rivals in the Champions League. Robinho certainly has the potential to succeed in the Premier League. However, in Spanish football he was often lost in games against the top teams and complained a lot about tackled. We will see…..
Looking at the fixture list and there is a rather interesting fixture. The next set of league games on 13th September: Manchester City v Chelsea 17:30. LOL!!! The fixture list always seems to work out like this!!!
The Abu Dhabi United Group “bought” City in the morning and they were really quick with they “bidding”. Apparently they even bid for Berbatov trying to ruin United’s deal!! They also tried to sign David Villa. It has also come out today that they want to sign Cristiano Ronaldo, Torres and Fabregas in the January transfer window. Football will never be the same again!! Not sure if its going to be a good thing for British football and the smaller clubs. Its going to be even more about the money….. 
They will apparently bid about £135m for Ronaldo!!! The main “spokesman” behind the deal new owner Dr Sulaiman Al-Fahim has said “Ronaldo has said he wants to play for the biggest club in the world, so we will see in January if he is serious”. Cheeky!!! He needs to know that the biggest club is not just about money though!!
(The actual person with all the money is Sheikh Munsoor bin Zayed al Nahyan, who has a 90 per cent stake in the consortium. There is no official estimate of his wealth but he and his brothers control Abu Dhabi Sovereign Wealth Fund which is valued at £460 Billion. (Roman Abramovich is worth £12billion).
Anyway, back to the football and you do in some way have to feel sorry for Shaun Wright Philip – hes just left Chelsea to go back to City who are now the “new Chelsea”. He should be able to get in the team but having Robinho in the team is tough competition.
What a busy day in Manchester!!!!
For all the transfers check them out on the BBC Sport web site. Here are the deals which happened on the day:
In: Blackburn (Bunn), Everton (Fellaini, Saha, Nash), Hull (Cousin), Liverpool (Flora, Gulacsi, Riera), Man City (Robinho), Man Utd (Berbatov), Newcastle (Gonzalez, Xisco), Portsmouth (Belhadj), Sunderland (McCartney), Stoke (Higginbotham, Soares, Tonge), Tottenham (Pavlyuchenko, Corluka, Campbell), West Brom (Donk)
Out: Bolton (Dzemaili), Fulham (Zakuani, John, Smertin), Liverpool (Finnan, Voronin), Man City (Corluka, Vidal), Man Utd (Saha, Campbell), Portsmouth (Cranie, Christophe), Sunderland (Higginbotham), Stoke (Parkin), Tottenham (Berbatov), West Ham (McCartney), Wigan (Bouaouzan, Nash, Sibierski)
There was also talk of Barton going to Portsmouth from Newcastle. Thankfully that was just a stupid rumour – Harry Redknapp has more sense I hope! However that was just a small “story” relating to Newcastle compared to what happened today (and may happen????). According to some reports Kevin Keegan has left Newcastle after only 8 months. There are various reports on why he was involved including lack of money to sign players, the players Newcastle signed not being players he choose and also something to do with Barton and playing him in the last game (even though he is still to be charged by the FA etc). The latest is that Newcastle say he wasnt sacked – no word from Keegan himself and whether he quit?? Its just madness at Newcastle!!
Tags: berbatov, manchester city, manchester united, newcastle, robinho
