Monthly Archives: July 2014

Kingsley Coman: I snubbed Arsenal, Bayern & Liverpool for Juventus

The 18-year-old made four appearances in all for Paris Saint-Germain before moving to the Italian giants and says he rejected offers from London, Munich and Merseyside


Kingsley Coman claims he rejected offers from Arsenal, Bayern Munich and Liverpool before joining Juventus.

Coman completed his move to Italy from Paris Saint-Germain earlier this week, signing a five-year deal with the Serie A champions.

And the 18-year-old claims he had a number of offers from England – as well as Germany and France – before he eventually opted to move to Antonio Conte’s side.

“Juventus has a history with French players,” he told L’Equipe.

“Some of them did very good. So I told myself, why not me? I thought about it a lot. I had to take a decision regarding PSG.

“Then there was Arsenal, Liverpool, Leverkusen, Bayern Munich and Bordeaux. I’ve hesitated a lot about Bordeaux and I talked with Willy Sagnol, I knew him from the France Under-21 team and he promised me playing time.

“But this process came a little too late and I was already thinking about Juve.”

Coman made his PSG debut aged 16 – which saw him become the club’s youngest ever player – and went on to make four appearances in all for the French giants.

Markovic flies in for Liverpool medical

The 20-year-old Benfica winger is poised to complete a transfer to Anfield over the coming days after the Merseyside club activated his release clause


By Paul Clennam

Lazar Markovic has flown to Liverpool to undergo a medical ahead of a €25 million move to Anfield.

The Benfica winger was pictured at Portea Aeroporto in Portugal on Saturday morning and is understood to be on his way to Merseyside.

Markovic was originally scheduled to fly in on Thursday after the Anfield outfit agreed to pay the €25m release clause in the player’s contract.

But the transfer is now set to be completed this weekend as Liverpool push ahead with summer recruitment plans following the £70m sale of Luis Suarez to Barcelona.

Lazar Markovic leaves Lisbon with brother Filip and agent Ulisses Santos to become €25m Liverpool player. #LFC #SLB pic.twitter.com/2P33yXalpS

— Duncan Castles (@DuncanCastles) July 12, 2014

Markovic, who turned 20 in March, was part of an impressive forward line which helped Benfica to a place in the Europa League final last season.

However, he did not play in the penalty shootout defeat to Sevilla after being sent off from the bench in the semi-final against Juventus following an altercation with Mirko Vucinic.

Liverpool are also close to completing deals for Southampton centre-back Dejan Lovren and Belgium international Divock Origi.

The Merseyside club has already signed Saints pair Adam Lallana and Rickie Lambert, and former Bayer Leverkusen midfielder Emre Can.

Brendan Rodgers is bolstering his squad as the club aim to maintain last season’s Premier League title challenge while competing in the Champions League.

‘Suarez ban is draconian and fascist’

The Uruguay international’s legal representative will continue to contest the four-month Fifa ban handed to his client


Luis Suarez’ lawyer has vowed to take his fight against the striker’s four-month ban to the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) after labelling the suspension “draconian and facist”.

The Uruguay international was also hit with a nine-match international ban and a €82,000 fine by Fifa for biting Italy defender Giorgio Chiellini at the World Cup

Appeals against the sanction from Suarez himself and the Uruguyan FA were rejected by Fifa this week, but his legal representative, Alejandro Balbi, isn’t ready to give up the fight.

“We knew that Fifa would uphold the ban because they are corporatists,” Balbi told Cope.

“We won’t stop, we are going to go to CAS and we will keep taking every legal path available to us.”

Suarez, who is set to leave Liverpool for Barcelona after the two clubs confirmed on Friday that an agreement had been reached over his transfer to La Liga, is banned from all football-related activity until October 26.

“It’s blatantly draconian, totalitarian and fascist,” Balbi said.

“The right of a footballer to do his job is being violated and football should be concerned about that.

“The nine international matches may seem excessive, but the fact that he can’t watch a game of football or train or do his job, we are talking about very unpleasant things here.”