I believe we have a superb opportunity to rebuild this great club. This will require resources, planning, hard work and patience. We should not expect instant success, but our fans, employees and stakeholders can expect 100% commitment from me and my team. We will assemble a strong management team at every level of the club. We will act rapidly, but also plan for the long term, because I am here for the long term. I also look forward to the club re-engaging with the fans and the local community. We cannot succeed without their backing.

It is a massive breath of fresh air to see the new owners of a football club preaching these values over “get rich quick” values which are too often flaunted elsewhere. Of course, we will have to wait and see to what extent they deliver upon these pledges, but it is encouraging to see the new owners of a football club making it public that the rebuilding of a football club that has slipped two divisions from the Premier League will be from a sustainable base from which they intend to grow, rather then simply throwing money into a pit and hoping for the best.

The news has had an automatic effect on the club’s supporters. Those that turned out at the club’s first friendly, a 1-1 draw at Eastleigh last weekend, were still wondering whether they would be starting this season but season tickets will now be going on sale and the air of optimism around St Mary’s Stadium may prove to be critical as they aim to get promoted straight back into the Championship. The only thing against them in the build up to the new season is how soon it starts but, with many clubs at this level remaining in a state of turmoil, they have as good a chance as any to get promoted from League One, which promises to be one of the more intriguing divisions to watch next season.

Behind the scenes, there is no question that the new owners are acting rapidly. Coach Mark Wotte has already departed, leading to some speculation over the level of the new owners’ ambitions. His replacement for the time being is Stuart Henderson, but it seems doubtful that this will be a long term appointment. In another sign of the wave of optimism sweeping the club, goalkeeper Kelvin Davis turned down a move to Premier League West Ham United after being talked around by the club’s new owners. For a thirty-two year old player to turn down such a move when time may be starting to run out on his career (goalkeepers may have a longer sell-by date than outfield players, but Davis may only have a handful of seasons left as a player nevertheless) says a lot for the persuasive skills of the new owners.

Fine words, however, are one thing, and the onus is now on Liebherr to back up their statements with action. Southampton supporters have been kicked from pillar to post over the last four or five years by appalling management, and the club’s administrator John Fry’s parting words, “I would also like to take this opportunity to thank all Saints fans for their support and patience in what have been uncertain times for the club”, speak volumes about what attracted this new group to the club in the first place.

Such loyalty has earnt its reward this week, and the new owners, starting completely afresh, should at the very least be able to stabilise the club. The fact that someone will step into a club that is two promotions from the Premier League proves that the notion of a football club with 20,000 supporters playing in the second or third tier in the game being massively in debt is an anachronism that sums up the madness of the English game. There was, frankly, no need for Southampton to be in the mess in which they found themselves. If the new owners of the club can see their opening statement through to fruition, Southampton Football Club could have a very bright future indeed.

1. Chris Balderstone (Carlisle United, Leicestershire & England): Chris Balderstone was first spotted as a footballer by Bill Shankly and signed for Huddersfield Town before going to Carlisle United in 1966. He went on to make almost 400 appearances for Carlisle, including getting promoted into the First Division in 1974. His cricket career was more illustrious still. He won the Benson & Hedges Cup for Leicestershire in 1972 and the County Championship in 1975, as well as winning two test caps for England in 1976. Balderstone died in 2000 from cancer, at the age of sixty.

2. Viv Richards (The West Indies & Antigua): The legendary Viv Richards played cricket for the West Indies for seventeen years between 1974 and 1991 and is widely accepted to be one of the greatest batsmen of all time. What is less well known is that he also occasionally turned out fo the Antiguan football team. It has to be said that his football career was somewhat less auspicious than his football career - he played in their qualification campaign for the 1974 World Cup finals, but Antigua lost all four of their matches, including an 11-0 defeat against Trinidad & Tobago and a 6-0 home defeat at the hands of Surinam.

3. William “Fatty” Foulke (Derbyshire, Sheffield United, Chelsea and England): Willam Foulke, owner of the least ambiguous nicknames in the history of sport, was a legendary goalkeeper for Sheffield United and Chelsea, as well as winning one cap for England. Foulke (who, after the 1902 FA Cup Final, chased the referee naked from the changing rooms and into a broom cupboard and had to be dragged away by understandably nervy FA officials) also made several appearances for Derbyshire CCC while playing for Sheffield United.

4. Steve Ogrizovic (Shrewsbury Town, Coventry City, Liverpool & Shropshire): Ogrizovic made four appearances for Liverpool before going on to make his fortune at Coventry City, for whom he made over 500 appearances. Whilst starting his career at Shrewsbury Town, however, Ogrizovic also played cricket for Shropshire and three times for the Minor Counties side in the Nat West Trophy during the early 1980s. Ogrizovic also once bowled Viv Richards out for the Minor Counties in a match against the tourning West Indies.

5. Ian Botham (Scunthorpe United, Yeovil Town, Somerset, Worcestershire & England): Botham earnt his fame with his famous performance for England at the 1981 Headingley test match against Australia, but also had half a go at playing football too. He made a grand total of eleven performances as a non-contract player for Scunthorpe United between 1979 and 1985, as well as a handful of appearances for (then non-league) Yeovil Town. After a fight on a Scunthorpe United team night out, he was arrested and almost missed out on a winter cricket tour for England to the West Indies.

6. Phil Neale OBE (Worcestershire, Scunthorpe United & Lincoln City): Phil Neale (not to be confused with the former Liverpool and England full-back Phil Neal) was probably the very last of the players that were professional footballers and cricketers at the same time. Whilst his football career didn’t progress above the bottom divisions of the Football League, he was very successful as a cricketer, captaining Worcestershire to four county championships between 1987 and 1989 (two of which were in the one day Sunday league). He has worked as a cricket coach since retiring in 1992.

7. Andy Goram (Oldham Athletic, Rangers & Scotland): The Rangers goalkeeper kept goal for both the Scotland football and cricket teams. His cricket career saw him play four times for his country ( he played 43 for the Scottish national football team), twice in the Nat West Trophy. He was reportedly banned from playing cricket by Rangers upon signing for them in 1991 for fear of picking up an injury.

8. Brian Close (Leeds United, Yorkshire & England): Brian Close, the legendary Yorkshire and England cricket captain, had a cricket career that lasted for almost thirty years but he was almost lost to football before he started. His was signed as an amateur player by Leeds United. He became the first Leeds player to play at international level for any country and at any level when he represented England youth against Scotland in 1948. Not long after this, he gave up the (then) blue and yellow of Leeds United for the white flannels of Yorkshire.

9. Denis Compton (Arsenal, Middlesex & England): Along with his brother Leslie, Denis Compton had an illustrious career as both a footballer and a cricketer. He only played just over fifty games for Arsenal (though it is worth remembering that his football career was effectively wiped out by the start of the Second World War, which started just three years after he started playing. His cricket career, however, was one of the most spectacular in the entire history of English cricket. He played in seventy-eight test matches for England and hit seventeen centuries in those matches.

10. Geoff Hurst MBE (West Ham United, Essex & England): He may have scored the most famous hat-trick in the history of English football, but Geoff Hurst was also pretty useful with his hands, and he made one appearance for Essex in 1962 against Lancashire at Aigburth, in Liverpool. Unfortunately - and having got himself out without having scored in either of his innings for his county - this was his only appearance for the First XI, although he was a regular for the Essex Second XI for the next two seasons before deciding to focus on the football. It’s difficult to believe that he didn’t think that he had made the right decision by 1966.

Drugs are an emotive subject, one of those that brings out the shrillest voices on both sides of the argument and renders any rational debate essentially meaningless, but in the case of Kenny the matter seems fairly clear cut. Ephedrine is used as a performance enhancing stimulant in sport, most notably in Amercian football, athletics and weightlifting, where it is used to increase concentration levels. However, it is also used regularly used in prescription medicines (it’s not illegal under prescription in the UK), most often in some types of cough mixture, and this seems to be where Kenny had his fateful dose. Whether the amount that was found in him was potentially performance enhancing is unknown, but United’s immediate suspension of one of their longest serving players the seriousness with which clubs have to treat any situation in which a player fails a drug test.

There are few that would argue that performance enhancing drugs should be permitted in sport. Most carry health risks that are beyond what most would deem acceptable, but which sportsmen, desperate to earn as much money as they can in a career that is often over in a blink of the eye, may be more prone to such temptation.recreational drugs such as cocaine and cannabis, however, remains a more divisive matter. It should be self-evident that playing sport on them could never be described as “performance enhancing”. Anybody that has ever inhaled any cannabis would be able to tell you that the urge to sit and watch cartoons for eight hours will far outweigh the desire to go to the park and kick a ball about. However, there is a point to these drugs being banned in sport, which is the (tenuous in other circumstances) “role model” argument. Having said that, though, it could be argued that a greater problem for those concerned could be stored up if players with a drug habit feel that they can’t go to the game’s authorities with a desire to clean up if they know that they’re going to be “made an example of” and banned for a couple of years.

In the case of ephedrine in the amounts found in cough medicine, however, the argument is slightly more nuanced. There is no question that ephedrine is performance enhancing or that it is dangerous in larger quantities. The good news for Kenny, however, is that, unlike other banned substances, ephedrine no longer carries an automatic ban and further tests can be carried out which will confirm whether the drug was taken medicinally or with the intention of being used performance enhancing. Which way that test goes will go most of the way towards determining whether he receives a warning or a two year ban which, at 31 years of age, would probably end his career. Some may hope for a little moderation in the case of Paddy Kenny, but special care has to be taken when dealing with such issues.

Ultimately, Kenny only has himself to blame for the predicament in which he finds himself. As a professional sportsman, it is par of his job to know which substances are banned and where he may accidentally come across them. If the average lay person knows that there is a link between some types of cough medicine and ephedrine, then he should know this as well. In law, ignorance is not a defence and a question mark now hangs over his head which may last for the rest of his playing career.

Slough Town: The falling into disrepair of Slough Town’s Wexham Park became a symbol for the interminable wrangling between clubs and landlords which often threatens to drive clubs to the wall. Slough were evicted from Wexham Park in 2003 and have been trying to find a permanent new home since then, managing to share a ground at Windsor & Eton and Beaconsfield SYCOB as they tumbled down the divisions and out of the Southern League altogether. Last season (after being reprieved thanks to the collapse of Halifax Town) they stabilised somewhat in the Southern Division One South & West, and there was further good news for the club this week with the announcement that they have the full support of their local council to build a new 3,000 capacity stadium on the outskirts of the town, along with eighty-one houses. They will now submit a full planning application before the end of this year, but there is quiet optimism that after six years (and counting) of a nomadic existence, they could soon be returning home.

Scarborough Athletic: The old Scarborough ground at Seamer Road is another that continues to sit and rot. Follwing the collapse of Scarborough FC in 2007, two clubs - Town and Athletic - have emerged, with Athletic (who owned and run by their supporters trust) being the homeless ones. Town played in the amateur Wearside League but in a ground within the town, while Athletic were forced to play their home matches twenty miles away from home at Bridlington Town. With Seamer Road now in a state of disrepair that seems to preclude its use in the forseeable future, Athletic have been looking for a home of their own back in Scarborough for some time, but their search may also be appoaching an end. They confirmed a deal last week to ground-share with Town at the Pindar Sports College, back in Scarborough. The ground is only a basic one, but Athletic plan to bring it up to scratch to reach the Football Association’s Grade D (which includes the installation of such basics as floodlights, hard standing, turnstiles and a perimeter fence), which would be enough for them to compete in their current division, the North East Counties League Premier Division and the Unibond League Division One, which is the one above. It’s only a short term solution - the club’s ultimate goal is to be back pushing for a place in the Football League again - but it’s a start.

Enfield Town: The sale of Southbury Road in 1999 proved to be the catalyst which led to the formation of AFC Wimbledon and the other clubs that came about because their supporters had had enough. By 2001, Enfield FC were still ground-sharing and the club was making no effort to find a new home back in the London Borough of Enfield, so the supporters broke away and formed a new club, Enfield Town. Town have shared grounds with nearby Brimsdown Rovers since then, but in October 2008 they confirmed a plan to move to the QE2 athletics stadium, barely half a mile from their old home. The club is desperately raising £50,000 towards paying for this move, and remain optimistic that they will move home for the start of the 2010/11 season. The solution of playing at an athletics stadium isn’t an ideal one and has caused some disquiet, but a home of their own would be a massive step forward towards reclaiming the place near the top of the non-league table that they held from the 1960s until the end of the 1980s.

FC United of Manchester: FCUM’s hopes for a ground of their own are possibly the most intriguing of the lot. Since their formation in 2005 they have, in no small part due to safety considerations brought about because of their 2,000+ crowds, played their home matches at Gigg Lane, the home of League Two club Bury. However, the cost of renting Gigg Lane is almost prohibitively expensive and the club needs a home of its own. Last month, however, the club announced an open tender to build a sustainable new stadium in Manchester (no definite site seems to have been indentified yet) whilst Manchester-based architects, Judge Gill, are working on a 7,000 capacity stadium for an unnamed club which some believe to be FCUM. The club signed a new ground share deal at Bury earlier this summer, but the fact that it was only signed for two years has also been taken by some as being a further sign that the club is preparing to move to a home of its own. Nothing is guaranteed yet, but if any club is capable of building a unique stadium with the best interests of its fans at heart, it has to be FC United of Manchester.

It’s not all good news, of course. It never is, is it? Gloucester City remain stranded in Cirencester following the ruination of their Meadow Park during the terrible floods of 2007. Aylesbury United will be groundsharing at Leighton Town next season, with a move back to Aylesbury seeming as far away as ever. There are plenty of others. This is a battle that isn’t over yet, and the economic downturn may prove to be a short term blip before the vultures start hovering again. Football grounds may yet prove to be prime real estate again in the near future.

The site later became a part of the 365 Media Group, which was in turn bought out by Sky in 2007. There had been complaints about Sky’s management of the sites since it took over - not least a revamp of the design of the site and the forums which proved unpopular and were said to be less user-friendly. To this extent, Sky could be described as the architects of the site’s downfall. Some Rivals.net sites went independent, whilst others chose to move to competitors such as Vital Football. However, there had been no warning of the decision being made to the people that continued to use the site, and the sudden closure was a shock to them, at least.

In some respects, Rivals.net will not be missed by many. Although the site was one of the first to offer an interactive forum service, the forums were occasionally poorly administrated and managed. Some forums would have moderators that blocked any opinions that differed from those of the people running the site, whilst others would simply allow people to run amok, only stopping to actually moderate in the most extreme cases. The news has also been greeted with a degree of glee by their competitors in the field, who have been quick to offer users of Rivals.net a new home. What is more troubling about the sudden closure of Rivals is the way in which it was done, with the people running the site being offered no opportunity to back up material that had taken a considerable amount of time to write.

For the people writing the sites, this was the ultimate kick in the teeth. Reportedly, site owners were not notified of the closure until some time after the plug had been pulled meaning that they simply had no chance to back up their output, which is a pretty rotten piece of behaviour on the part of Sky. Why not at least email the webmasters two or three days beforehand to let them know that this was going to happen and give them a chance to save their work? Sometimes it seems as if Sky almost seem to relish playing the pantomime villain in this sort of situation. They haven’t explained their decision above and beyond it having been taken for commercial reasons, which is fair enough - few would argue that Sky should act as a charity and maintain a loss-making network of sites. This doesn’t, however justify the way in which they did it. For a company that makes a lot of a fuss over how passionate it is about football (this has been a central theme of their advertising for many years), to treat football supporters in this way gives the impression of their mask slipping.

There is a silver lining to this story in that some of the more popular forums are already up and running again, and the hope is that many of the original sites will be able to start again independently in the fullness of time. However, Sky’s actions have ripped another small hole in British fan culture, and the moral of this story may be that independence may be the best way forward for sites of this type. Regardless of what one might feel about the quality of debate that sometimes took place on their forums there is no doubt that an enormous amount of work went into the many Rivals sites, and their administrators deserved better treatment than this.

In this series of articles, Bates called Levi a “shyster” and accused him of having blackmailed the club. He also printed Levi’s home address and telephone number, in what the judge at the case called “in effect an invitation to Leeds fans to pester Mr Levi”. Bates defended the accusation on the basis that these statements were “fair comment”. He didn’t turn up to the trial and the judge didn’t agree with him, awarding £50,000 damages in favour of Levi and, more troublingly for Bates, £1,5m in legal costs against the Leeds chairman. Ken Bates is a man that has got used to getting his own way over the years, but this time it rather feels as if he has been dealt a stinging rebuke.

The judge in the case, Sir Charles Gray, was pretty straightforward in his assessment of the case. In summary, he  concluded that the damages award was so high because of the following:

- “the gravity of the libels: the allegation of blackmail is particularly serious”
- “the fact that the libels were repeated on several occasions over a period of ten months”
- “the fact that Mr Bates sought unsuccessfully to justify his statements about Mr Levi”
- “perhaps most important of all, the obvious distress and injury to Mr Levi’s feelings caused by the libels”

These are serious allegations, but it is also worth reflecting upon what this means about what was going on at Leeds United. Levi was a part of the “Yorkshire Consortium”, which bought into the club in 2005, before selling a majority shareholding to Bates in 2006. The relationship between the pair of them too a turn for the worse after a note confirming Levi’s concerns that a “call option” (which would have given Bates the right to buy the remainder of the shares in the club had lapsed. The letter was leaked by David Richmond, a Leeds United director at the time and the son of Geoffrey Richmond, the former Bradford City chairman.

The tone of the articles was nasty, as was the language used by Bates. He claimed that his use of the word “shyster” to describe Levi (who is of the Jewish faith) was not racially motivated, in which case the best that one can respond is by saying that anyone that uses it towards a Jew is either a racist or uniquely unaware of the connotations which it carries. This, however, is arguing over semantics. The overall picture painted by the summary of the trial is one of a man that is prepared to try and ruin and opponent’s career through a mixture of libellous words and giving the impression of wishing to stir the worst aspects of the Leeds support into making personal attacks against Mr Levi. Simon Myerson QC, for the prosecution, had this much to say on Bates’s behaviour:

Mr Bates’s conduct and his conduct of the case justify an award of aggravated damages towards the top of the bracket. The use of the programme to pressure Mr Levi, the attribution to him of the failure of the rights issue, the publication of his name and address and the use of Mr Levi as a scapegoat are all matters which should sound in damages. Mr Bates has not proved the truth of any of his factual allegations. He has not only failed to prove the facts he relies upon, he has consistently stated them in a way which was untrue as at the time of publication.

There has been talk that Leeds United AFC themselves, as the publishers of the articles in question, would end up having to foot the bill for Bates’ indiscretions. Mr Levi remains a Leeds United supporter but there is a case for saying that the club will end up footing the bill for their chairman’s antics and if the club does end up paying, it will be those hard done by supporters that end up footing the bill. What is more surprising is the fact that no-one seems to have advised Bates to settle out of court - unless, of course, he received such advice and refused to pay any attention. One thing is for certain, though. The articles written by Ken Bates that have landed him in so much hot water are his words, and not those of his football club.

It was reported when both Avram Grant and Felipe Scolari quit the club that player power had got out of control, and Claude Makelele’s autobiography, released earlier this year, claimed that Terry had been the major factor behind Jose Mourinho’s removal from Stamford Bridge. Somehow, though, the managers were blamed for this rather than the players themselves, although it all seemed to calm down a little bit when Guus Hiddink took over. Maybe, as a personal friend of Roman Abramovich, he had a quiet word with the owner before he left to return to Russia, but it certainly seems as if a tipping point has been reached.

At the start of the summer - and with a lack of self-awareness that is almost endearing - Terry gave a list of the players that he feels that Chelsea should sign (one would like to think on a sheet of paper headed “From The Mind On John Terry and written in purple crayon) to the club’s management. As we said on here at the time, perhaps unsurprisingly it didn’t have any central defenders on it. None of the players on that list have since signed for Chelsea. Such behaviour is in keeping with someone that has long seemed to be of the opinion that he is “mas que un player”.

It is entirely possible that the management of the club are playing a game of double bluff. Much as they wouldn’t want to lose Terry as a player, they have to reign in his influence at Stamford Bridge. He may well have a future at the club, but what the club itself is starting to realise is that his influence is starting to run out of control and that the drawbacks of having him there may be starting to outweigh what he brings to the team. Manchester City seem more than happy to throw money at both Terry and the club, and there seems to be a suspicion that Terry is using City’s interest to try and leverage himself a pay increase from the £140,000 per week that he already earns.

“Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me” may well be the belief within Stamford Bridge. Roman Abramovich is a largely benign presence at the club, but he rules with an iron fist when necessary. Their sole big signing of the summer so far, Yuri Zhirkov, would seem to indicate that they are finally starting to act in the manner of a club which is self sufficient in its funding for players. £4om starts to look like an attractive deal for a defender who, at twenty-nine years old and having had a back injury recently, may be starting to pass his peak, especially if it sends out a message to the rest of the playing staff that the days of them running the training sessions and picking the team may be at an end.

All of this comes, of course, on the day that Carlo Ancelotti takes over at Stamford Bridge. It is impossible to say what the new manager’s view of the club captain may be, but Chelsea are paying him a lot of money and it is difficult to believe that he will put up with what the likes of Avram Grant did before him. There is, with the other Big Four clubs stagating in the transfer market this summer, a window of opportunity for Chelsea ro reassert their position at the top of the Premier League this season. John Terry could yet rescue his career at Stamford Bridge, but it will need to be a new, humbler Terry that does so.

It isn’t the first time that this has happened, but there is an added sting in the tail for Farsley Celtic. The semi professional leagues have already announced their fixtures for the coming season. Farsley Celtic have no league to drop into. This isn’t a merely an issue that will surely now result in the closure of a club that was playing Blue Square Premier football just two years ago. It also causes the lower reaches of the English football pyramid a headache. Do they start next season’s Blue Square North with an odd number of clubs? This would almost certainly cause complaints. Someone would have a free weekend every week, and someone would miss out on potentially lucrative Christmas and Bank Holiday matches.

The alternatives would be to save someone from relegation, or to utilise the space which exists in the Unibond League at present because of the recent collapse of Newcastle Blue Star, but both sets of fixtures would have to be completely rewritten. Whether this would be possible just a few weeks before the start of the new season is open to question. Such matters may, however, be rendered irrelevant should Farsley seek to appeal against the Football Conference’s decision through the Football Association. The FA have the right to over-rule the decision, though the matter of whether they would, whilst in administration, be able to afford any sort of legal challenge to the Football Conference is also questionable. It worked for Northwich Victoria earlier this summer, though.

It seems likely that, in view of the logistical problems that this would result in, the club will be allowed to start next season, providing they are still a going concern by then. The Football Conference, however, have rules that everyone is aware of. Once Farsley entered into administration they had, in the eyes of their own rules, no option to but to expel them. They may well be keeping their fingers crossed that the FA appeal the decision. They would have been seen to be upholding their rules, the fixture list would remain in tact, and Farsley would end up being punished, in that they would almost certainly be deducted ten points for the start of the season. The alternative is the abyss.

And then, in a few weeks time, perhaps we can get on with the 2009/10 football season.

Of course, there is a chance that this is all an elaborate hoax. At this very moment, Alex Ferguson and David Gill could be sitting on the floor in an office surrounded by empty beer cans and whisky bottles, laughing themselves stupid that so many people seem to be falling for it. Just imagine what colour Alex Ferguson’s face might be at this very moment. They may have spent the first couple of days this week plotting it, and drawing up a list with names such as Joey Barton, Jason Lee and Ade Akinbiyi on it before settling upon Michael as the ultimate satirical signing.

The concept of Michael Owen’s medical to join Manchester United works on so many different levels that it could have been written by John Cleese and Graham Chapman. Tomorrow morning, a surgeon could find himself reaching into Michael’s leg, pulling something out on the end of a pair of forceps, holding it up to the light and asking, very slowly and deliberately, “Is this… a Twiglet? I never even knew you could hold someone’s knee ligaments together with one of these”. Should he pass it, though, he’ll be playing Champions League football next season. Presuming he’s fit, that is.

There is, in a way, a degree of sense behind Ferguson’s pursuit of him. He tried to sign Owen as a youth player and is reported to have made a couple of attempts to take him to Old Trafford before. He breaks United’s recently introduced  “no players over 26″ rule, but only because he is - at least in terms of transfer fees - free. They might hold on to him for a few months, give him a handful of run-outs and then sell him on for what they can get for him. That would be the ultimate expression of the free market, wouldn’t it? Patch him up, give him the “good enough for Alex Ferguson” kudos and flog him on.

Regardless of the signing of Owen, this summer is rapidly going down the tubes. They’ve missed out on Karim Benzema and will almost certainly miss out on Franck Ribery. They signed Antonio Valencia from Wigan Athletic and he seems like a decent enough player, but it seems that they are unlikely to start next season with a squad as strong as he one that finished last season. This could be down to the crippling cost of their loan interest repayments. The sale of Ronaldo will cover that for a couple of years, but what would be a fortune to almost every other club in Europe isn’t anything like as much to Manchester United.

All of this makes the Premier League a little more interesting than it has been for several years. Manchester United aren’t just hoovering up the best players in the world, and have shed a couple. Chelsea have yet another new manager who is still having English lessons. Liverpool, who primarily failed to win the Premier League last season because they failed to kill off teams too often and consequently drew too many matches, have signed a right-back and missed out on Gareth Barry, the player that they really wanted. The faintly musty smell of decline continues to hang over Arsenal. Nothing is guaranteed, but things might just be a tiny bit more even next season.