Today's tell-all is feeling very international
Ah, international week. Generally a window of rich promise for peddlers of idle football speculation as British based foreigners return home and give interviews to journalists in their home countries, occasionally forgetting that thanks to advances in modern technology - winged monkeys, telegrams and fax machines - their sentiments are invariably translated and reported back in Blighty before they've returned to their hotel room and switched on the PlayStation.
You know the drill: a disgruntled player will mouth off about his dissatisfaction only to later claim he was misquoted, or else he'll give a perfectly harmless and bland interview that will subsequently get wilfully contorted beyond all recognition by mischievous British media outlets.
Expect the latter to happen over the next couple of days with *Luis Suárez*. Speaking at a press conference in Montevideo, where he is preparing for Uruguay's World Cup qualifier with Paraguay, the Liverpool striker said that while he is currently "very happy" at Liverpool, he would welcome approaches from clubs "with more prospects of competing in international club competition games". Expect a scramble involving such clubs as Manchester City, Bayern Munich, Juventus and Tottenham Hotspur.
Currently in Abidjan where Ivory Coast enter The Scorpions of Gambia in a World Cup qualifier this weekend, we await news of what *Yaya Touré* has to say to local reporters with interest. Chelsea and Real Madrid are both believed to be interested in signing the occasionally lumbering Manchester City midfielder who is feeling unappreciated at the Etihad and has told Manchester City he will leave this summer if a new deal was not agreed by Saturday. Sergio Agüero may also leave City during the summer, with Real Madrid apparently ready to splash £45m on the 24-year-old Argentinian, who has been released from the Argentina squad because of a knee injury.
Spanish TV station Punto Pelota has claimed that a top secret meeting was staged between representatives Atletico Madrid and Chelsea last Sunday to discuss a proposed move for *Radamel Falcao*. So top secret that it's now being reported in newspapers the length and breadth of Spain, England and the player's homeland of Colombia, El Tigre will no doubt face questions about this frenzied speculation from the press in Barranquilla, where he is presumably on duty with his national team, who take on Bolivia tomorrow.
Vasco da Gama and Brazil centre-half *Dede* is for sale and wanted by Liverpool and Manchester United, whose fans can see what the successful bidder w2ould be getting for their money by clicking on this colourful link here. In one of those part-ownership deals involving South American footballers that aren't in any way complicated, Vasco hold 45% of the player's registration, the Brazilian equivalent of Asda own another 45% and some investment group own the remaining 10%. Good luck sorting that one out.
Athletic Bilbao's Venezuelan defender* Fernando Amorebieta* is being linked with a move to Arsenal waiting for Arsenal to make a move for him. Born in Anzoátegui, Venezuela but reared in Spain by Basque parents (hence his eligibility to play for Bilbao), Amorebieta once received a call-up for Spain but didn't play and decided to throw his hat in the ring of the country of his birth. The Rumour Mill likes to think the hat in question looked like this.
The news that Sporting Lisbon want to get £5m-rated winger *Diego Capel* off their books has got antennae twitching at White Hart Lane, while the agent of Aston Villa striker Andreas Weimann has played down speculation linking his client with a move to Inter. Norwich are also reported to be interested in securing the Austrian's scrawl. Barcelona's backroom team could be trimmed if Bayern Munich manager-in-waiting is successful in his attempts to lure physiotherapist *Emili Ricart* and scouts *Domenec Torrent* and *Carles Planchart* to Bavaria.
And finally, assorted La Liga footballers past and present are swallowing nervously now that Madrid's answer to Dr Nick Riviera from The Simpsons has told a court he'd be willing to name the owners of the blood seized from his fridge. Eufemiano Fuentes is currently on trial for running a doping network in cycling and has already admitted to having footballers, track and field athletes, tennis players and boxers among his clients. "This would be in exchange for mutual collaboration," said Fuentes, who is facing a two-and-a-half year stretch in the Big House and appears to be ready to bargain. "If the list was necessary within this collaboration, they would get it."
That's your lot for this morning. As Dr Nick might say ... bye, everybody!
Barry Glendenning
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