Chelsea have appointed Avram Grant as director of football, just three days after their chief executive, Peter Kenyon, made a call for unity next season. It is believed that attempts to bring Grant to the club in January were met with resistance from the club's manager, Jose Mourinho. It even appeared the issue might hasten Mourinho's departure from Stamford Bridge but the Portuguese has since been persuaded to tolerate changes in the club's managerial structure.
Grant, 52, will be responsible for "liaison on, and coordination of, football matters across the various areas of Chelsea FC".
He will also be given a place on the club's football board and it will be intriguing to see how he balances his role working with the club's directors alongside his football involvement with Mourinho. Grant will report to Kenyon, the chief executive, who has a good relationship with Mourinho.
The chemistry between Mourinho and the director of football will be tested immediately, with Grant joining the first team on their pre-season tour to California, which begins today.
Mourinho, though, may take comfort from the way Grant performed a similar role as technical director at Portsmouth, where he was a popular and uncontroversial presence.
Of Grant, a club statement said: "His experience and knowledge will play an important role in the formulation of overall football policy with Kenyon, manager and first-team coach Jose Mourinho and director of youth development and scouting Frank Arnesen."
Chelsea hope to complete the signing of the Lyon midfielder Florent Malouda later today with a view to the France international joining the rest of the squad, who are due to depart Heathrow for the US this morning, in Los Angeles.
Malouda will cost £13.6 million and is expected to sign a four-year contract to become Chelsea's first cash signing of the summer.
Michael Ballack's fitness will be assessed before he travels to the US. He has twice had surgery on his ankle since the end of April but the club hope he may play some part in their final match, against David Beckham's LA Galaxy on July 21st.
Meanwhile, Spanish champions Real Madrid may test the commitment of Cesc Fabregas to Arsenal by trying to sign the talented midfielder. Madrid's sporting director, Predrag Mijatovic, said yesterday that the 20-year-old is one of the players his club are likely to attempt to recruit.
"Of course we are interested in Cesc," said Mijatovic. "We've been interested in him for over a year now and we are still interested. He is a great player and I expect all the big clubs will be interested."
Milan's Kaka and the Chelsea forward Arjen Robben are other players who are understood to be on the shopping list of the Real Madrid president, Ramon Calderon, though Milan have made it clear that the Brazilian is not for sale and will be staying in Italy.
Calderon infuriated Arsenal last week by claiming there had been talks with Arsene Wenger about succeeding Fabio Capello as Real Madrid's coach. That was strongly denied by Arsenal who will also be unimpressed by Mijatovic talking openly about their interest in Fabregas.
Wenger is unlikely to even contemplate the departure of Fabregas, who last year signed an eight-year contract which commits him until 2014. His agent, Joseba Diaz, says that the midfielder regards Wenger as his "mentor" and that he has not thought about leaving.
"Had Wenger left Arsenal it would have been a completely different story," he said.
The Premier League is to test Hawk-Eye technology at Reading's academy with hopes of a "blind trial" next season, when it could be tried in matches but not used by the officials.
Paul Hawkins, the company's managing director, said: "We have a contract with the Premier League to develop a system purely to resolve the dispute whether the ball crossed the line, purely for the referee and not for television. The process is to be evaluated by the Premier League and then Fifa. If we jump those hurdles then the end aim is to have it installed in all Premier League grounds." Hawkins believes it could be a part of the English game within two years.
Celtic's manager, Gordon Strachan, has accepted the blame for their 4-1 defeat at Young Boys Berne on Saturday. "To have them train for 140 minutes before the game wasn't a good idea," he said. "That's as simple as that, but that was my fault."
Darren Bent scored on his Spurs debut in a 3-1 win at Stevenage Borough and also won the penalty for Robbie Keane's opener.
Liverpool's first friendly resulted in a 3-2 win at Wrexham, the Austrian teenager Besian Idrizaj scoring a 19-minute hat-trick.
Sunderland versus Spurs will start the Premiership season on August 11th, kick-off at 12.45pm on Sky Sports and the first of its 92 live games in the season. Setanta opens with Aston Villa v Liverpool the same day and will also show Roy Keane's return to Manchester United, when he brings Sunderland to town on September 1st.
Guardian Service
