Today’s transfers, so far:

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A nice merry-go-round we have here.

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Must be a tough day for managers today. Almost every club is looking to sign or sell players and to add to the drama, they have to prepare their teams for the weekend games as well. This is why managers have assistants to deal with most of the team’s training and preparation and in some cases clubs appoint directors of football to handle the transfers.

Assuming Curbishley has both, what the hell does he do at West Ham then? Motivate them? He’s not a great motivator to begin with, so…

Anyway, on with this weekend’s predictions - to add your own, copy-paste the list at the end of the article and make your predictions in the comments.

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For just the second time in the competition’s history, both Rangers and Celtic have made it through to the Champions’ League proper. In store for both sides are some tricky ties and I do wonder if either team has it in them to reach the last 16 again.

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Today is the biggest day in the calendar for all revenue-junkies with a football news website - ranging from the BBC to the Sun to Soccerlens to that new blog that’s just gotten accepted on NewsNow.

Sure, the CL final is big. Sure, the World Cup final is pretty big as well. But nothing beats the adrenaline rush of real 24-hour news reporting, especially if your previous bullshit turned out to be false in which case you have so much more to print!

If you support a football club, today is NOT the day to read the news.

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This season’s Champions League fixture dates have been announced and the individual fixtures for the group stages have been finalised.

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Of all the idiotic rumours you’ve heard, this one has to be near the top of the list (mind you, I would talk about West Ham’s loan bid for Adriano but that was very real and then I’d have FC crawling all over me talking about the potato on his shoulder…).

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The timing is impeccable, even if some of it is coincidence - Arsenal have made a good start to their Premiership campaign, Arsene Wenger looks set to sign a new contract (at the very least he’s making all the right noises), the players are maturing and financially, Arsenal is doing better than most people feared. Best of all, the whole ‘Kroenke’ thing has died down.

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There has been some kerfuffle over Arsenal’s application to trademark the term ‘Gooner’, mainly surrounding the concern over how this trademark could affect usage of ‘Gooner’ for fans.

You can find the list of items the trademark is intended to cover here (thanks Arseblog), and if you read the list, it’s all clothing or ‘household linen’ - no need to worry about any trademark issues for Arsenal fan-sites, at least not yet.

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My god, they do waste their (ours, actually) time in making a spectacle out of this mess, don’t they?

The actual process would take less than 10 minutes, but to stretch it out to it’s current form of madness - ridiculous. Luckily (or unluckily, I’m not sure), I was only able to follow through the audio feed, which got stuck a few times in the middle but gave me the unadulterated joy of … well, it was just as painful as watching it on TV, I assure you).

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Brought to you by the Barcelona blog.

The team responded to the criticism by turning in a fine display to beat a lucklustre Inter Milan 5-0 in tonight’s Joan Gamper. Before the game the club remembered Antonio Puerta by having the team run out all wearing the number 16 Sevilla shirt that he wore. There was also a remembrance for Nicolau Casaus who died earlier this month.

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What is it with Richard Scudamore, the Premier League’s (PL) chief executive, that makes journalists from the Mail to the Guardian so disparaging? ”He does talk a lot of rubbish” being Richard Williams’ succinct take in the latter.

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A quick look at SL fantasy football and after the first month or so, I think it’s clear to say that Taron, a United fan who picked his team from clubs he hated, is comfortably top of the table, and he’s 6th overall in the SquadGod standings (so you don’t win an ipod mate but you’re in the running for there big prize at the end of the season).

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2 more days to go before the transfer window screeches to a welcome halt and then we can all get back to cursing injuries and inept referees.

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A transfer move that has all the trappings of a real move (down to the ‘inside news’ that both players have agreed to the swap) but the ridiculousness of randomly generated nonsense.

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Inter Milan’s Adriano has had a tough time of late - injuries, disciplinary problems and a falling out with his manager means that he’s fast on the exit list for Inter and they are calling anyone and everyone (including Arsenal) with a view of selling their striker.

The idea is for Adriano to go out on loan, but reportedly the Brazilian has rejected the option and challenged Inter Milan to either stick by him or to sell him off. That raises a tough question for the sides chasing Adriano, as both West Ham and Manchester City have been aiming for a loan deal.

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The Beeb reports that West Ham have made a 5m bid for Reading left-back Nicky Shorey. Shorey’s a good player and West Ham will improve thanks to him, but I don’t think that moving to West Ham would turn into a good career move for Shorey.

This has nothing to do with whether I like West Ham or not (so don’t go there - I like the Hammers); on the other hand it’s all about the West Ham manager and the squad currently assembled at West Ham.

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The Beeb reports that Portsmouth boss Harry Redknapp is willing to let Nugent go in order to raise funds for a bid for Nicolas Anelka. In my view it could be a swap deal with Portsmouth offering cash plus Nugent to secure Anelka’s services.

However, if Harry’s looking for a striker that can score 15-20 goals in a season for Portsmouth, isn’t Nugent the right man for it?

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The season may only be four games old but already I can see Rangers and Celtic running away with it once again. Total domination seems likely after Rangers hit seven against Falkirk who managed just two in reply. That was followed up by Celtic hitting Hearts for five the following weekend, this time with no response from a lackluster Gorgie side who look a shadow of their side of two years ago.

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With the finals of the SuperLiga fast approaching, I found myself asking the question of if anyone cares? The Mexican teams are more concerned with their own league, and the MLS teams are more concerned with the playoff run that is about to take place throughout the league. So what was the point of this tournament?

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The “Racism” debate has sprung up again, this time in wake of how a section of traveling Newcastle fans abused Middlesbrough’s Ahmed Mido with racist chants. Seeing the quality of the slurs, I have to say the fans must have been drunk beyond hope, but despite the lack of apparent talent it just raises another issue that we have been unable to face up to as football fans.

You cannot kick racism out of football. It doesn’t work that way.

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Spain international Antonio Puerta has died after suffering a heart attack in his club side Sevilla’s 4-1 win against Getafe on Saturday.

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US soccer blog, StateSideFooty, has had a successful first couple of weeks, getting a mention on the ESPN blogs and dozens of emails from MLS and US soccer fans writing in to compliment Danny and Brian on their new venture.

Not all new blogs thrive (or even survive) in the long run, but the way SSF has taken off and built a readership, I’m sure that it will become the best source for MLS news and US national team news in the next 12 months.

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4 days left to go in August and hopefully we can keep you updated through all the madness.

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I just don’t find it appropriate for a club chairman to publicly criticise players or comment on such matters out in the open. It’s good press, but because it’s just one person berating the other, it quickly turns into a slanging match and we get half-truths, which isn’t fun to begin with.

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The press have long linked Deco with a move away from Barcelona, and at this point, AC Milan, Manchester City and Newcastle United have all been strongly linked to the Portuguese midfielder. I think it’s a bit unfair on him considering what he’s achieved at the club and with all the speculation if Barcelona wanted to sell him they should have done so earlier (he’s not going to fetch that much now, is he?).

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Marca reports that Liverpool have lodged a 13.5m offer with Real Madrid for Julio Baptista.

You’ve got to be kidding me, right?

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The biggest news in the transfer circles is the surprising rumour that Chelsea are after Barcelona’s Ronaldinho.

The rumour seems to be another product of the Spanish media, and it caused Barcelona, already under criticism for their opening-day draw at home, to issue a denial and categorically stating that Ronaldinho was not for sale.

We could be naive and believe whatever we read, but with 3-4 days to go, there’s hardly any point of Chelsea making a move for Ronaldinho now, is there? Chelsea have traditionally conducted their transfer business early and gotten done with it unless the other party creates too many obstacles (Essien, Alves) and if they had been interested in Ronny this would have come out a lot earlier - as it was, it has been Milan and not Chelsea who have been after Ronaldinho.

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The good news today for Newcastle fans is that Sammy Lee has said that he will no longer stand in the way of letting Abdoulaye Faye leave for Newcastle, and the transfer is expected to go through imminently.

A fee was agreed over the weekend between the two clubs and the other items that were holding up the transfer - whatever they were - have been ironed out. We’ll wait to hear a confirmation of Faye’s signing on the Official Newcastle United web-site.

Big Sam is also looking for a new right-back after losing both Stephen Carr (hamstring strain) and Peter Ramage (knee ligaments) to injuries against Middlesbrough. Carr will be out anywhere from 2-6 weeks depending on the severity of the strain, but Peter may be sidelined for months - the knee is too sore to assess the damage at the moment.

We really have no idea who Sam will be after for right-back in the next three days - so we’ll just have to wait and see on that one.

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Although Solskjaer was never going to be a main player for Manchester United this season, and we all knew he wasn’t going to last forever, but even looking at last season he still knows how to score goals, and could have been a great asset. Anyone who loves football can admire Ole’s unique ability to change a game, so he should be loved by many, and he will be a loss to football in general. Football will miss ya Ole

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