COME BACK SOL!
Headline of the day...
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COME BACK SOL
The story that dominates most of the papers this morning is of another humiliating climbdown for poor Steve McClaren. The Sun say that he is ready to ask Portsmouth defender Sol Campbell to come back from the international wastelands and partner Rio Ferdinand in the crucial Euro 2008 qualifiers, having put him out to pasture when he took charge a year ago. Like he did with David Beckham earlier this summer...
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COME BACK SOL
According to the Daily Star, it's not just Campbell who will get a reprieve from McClaren, but also David James, who could get into the squads because of the injury to Ben Foster.
DON'T BANK ON ME
All of this is because, as the Daily Mail report, Jamie Carragher is standing firm on his decision to quit international football, rather than go running back to Macca at the first opportunity.
MAC SOS FOR SOL
And the same story again in the Daily Express.
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BALLACK: GIVE ME REAL DEAL
Despite releasing a statement yesterday about how much he wants to stay at Chelsea, in the Daily Star they reckon that Michael Ballack has said that he'll join Real Madrid if the Blues pay for him to go. Well, that sounds fair.
HEINZE IN TRANSFER HEARING
The Daily Telegraph report on Gabriel Heinze's attempts to move to Liverpool, and say that a Premier League arbitration hearing will decide his fate as he still wants to make the move against the wishes of his club.
DROGBA STRUGGLING TO BE FIT FOR KEY LIVERPOOL CLASH
Bad news for Jose Mourinho in The Guardian, as he looks likely to be missing Didier Drogba for Chelsea's early-season trip to Anfield.
Other top stories...
FOOTBALL REALLY DID STINK THIS SUMMER
The new season is coming and Des Kelly is back in the Daily Mail, and he isn't happy with what's been going on this summer. He hits out at the duplicity of the Carlos Tevez affair and the way that Thaksin Shinawatra has been allowed to take control of Manchester City without any real analysis of whether he's a 'fit and proper' person.
PLATINI FEARS FOR FUTURE OF CLUBS AMID SPREAD OF FOREIGN OWNERS
More doom and gloom in The Times, where Michel Platini warns that these new foreign owners are going to be bad for the English game: "They could be rich people coming to help English football and develop it, but they may just want to make money. I fear your clubs will lose identity."
WAGES SPIRAL OUT OF CONTROL
Ditto in the Daily Telegraph where financial analysts warn that many English clubs are flirting with disaster as wage bills soar into the stratosphere. And it's all that flippin' Roman Abramovich's fault.
MAVERICK SET FOR LATEST TWIST IN CAREER OF MANY SURPRISES
In The Independent they report on the life and times of Sol Campbell, not your average predictable footballer by any means...
READING AIM TO SIDESTEP PERIL OF NOT-SO-NEW BOYS
Meanwhile, The Guardian analyse Reading's situation as they look to avoid becoming the latest victims of 'second season syndrome'.
LET'S GET READY TO RUMBLE
According to the Daily Mirror, Steven Gerrard's fisticuffs in Rotterdam are a sign that he is ready to fight for the title.
FANS RAP BECKS
Bad news for David Beckham in The Sun, because American football fans are getting a little tired of waiting for him to actually play some games, with banners mocking him on display in Toronto.
