Coloccini joins Newcastle

Hamburg recover to draw with Bayern

Faye joins Premier new boys Stoke

Pizarro loaned out to Werder Bremen

Zenit St Petersburg claim they have lowered their asking price for Andrei Arshavin to clear the path for the Russia forward to move to Tottenham.

Newcastle United have completed the signing of 26-year-old defender Fabricio Coloccini from Deportivo La Coruna for an undisclosed fee believed to be in the region of £10million.

The Argentine international, who played every minute of Depor’s La Liga campaign last season, has signed a five-year deal with the Magpies and is expected to slot in alongside Steven Taylor.

Goals from Jose Paolo Guerrero and Piotr Trochowski completed a remarkable comeback for Hamburg against champions Bayern Munich in the opening match of the new Bundesliga season on Friday.

Stoke manager Tony Pulis has completed his fourth signing of the summer after Charlton midfielder Amdy Faye joined for an undisclosed fee.The 31-year-old Senegal international has joined the Potters on a 12-month deal.

Chelsea striker Claudio Pizarro has returned to Germany to join Werder Bremen on a one-year loan deal.

City’s European dream could be over while Villa stroll

Mutu to pay over £13 to Chelsea

Pompey and McKay charged by FA

The Beast set for move to Rome

Sven recalls veteren Blanco to Mexican Squad.

With just forty-eight hours to go before their first ever game in the top level of the English league, Hull City have once again had a busy day and have confirmed the signings of Wigan striker Marlon King on a season-long loan and Anthony Gardner in a £2.5m deal from Tottenham. King is Hull’s eight signing ahead of their first season in the top flight while Gardner is the club’s record signing. It has also been rumoured that boss Phil Brown has signed a new three year deal with the club.

Manchester City suffered a humiliating home defeat by Danish side FC Midtjylland in the first leg of their Uefa Cup second qualifying round tie while, Aston Villa beat FH Hafnarfjordur 4-1 to almost certainly seal their place in the next round. Gareth Barry played and scored and probably ends the speculation over whether he will join Liverpool.

Fifa has ordered former Chelsea striker Adrian Mutu to pay his former club £13.68m in damages for breach of contract after he tested positive for cocaine. Chelsea signed the Romanian from Parma for £15m in 2003 but the following year he tested positive and was given a seven-month worldwide football ban.

Dimitar Berbatov is still a wanted man and the saga took another twist today with Barcelona expected to make a bid for the Bulgarian international. At a press conference today Tottenham boss Juande Ramos was still confident that Berbatov would start the season at White Hart Lane.

Portsmouth and agent Willie McKay have been charged by the Football Association with breaches of rules in relation to the transfer of Benjani Mwaruwari to and from the club. Under the FA’s football agents regulations, agents are prohibited from acting for two different clubs in two consecutive transactions involving the same player.

Roma and Real Madrid have agreed a fee for the transfer of Brazil forward Julio Baptista for nine million euros plus up to a further two million if he plays a certain number of games and helps his new team into the Champions League.

Cuauhtemoc Blanco has been named in Sven-Goran Eriksson’s 25-man Mexico squad for the World Cup qualifier against Honduras after a one-year absence. The 35-year-old Chicago Fire forward last played for the Tricolor as Mexico finished third in the 2007 Copa America.

Kevin Taylor

Champions Celtic start with win

Forest and Reading draw

Olympic football news from Beijing

FA Cup winners Portsmouth showed plenty of charity to Manchester United by missing three of their four penalties in a penalty shoot-out to hand the Charity Shield to last season’s Premier league winners. United dominated the game but couldn’t score and game ended 0-0.

A controversial Barry Robson penalty was enough for Celtic to get their defence off to a winning start in the Scottish Premier. Before the game the championship flag was raised before the game by the widow of the late Celtic coach Tommy Burns.

Reading started life back in the championship with a 0-0 draw at the City Ground against Nottingham Forest.

Over in Beijing, Ronaldinho scored two goals in seven minutes to put Brazil through to the Olympic football quarter-finals during a 5-0 thrashing of New Zealand.

Argentina maintained their perfect record to guarantee progression from Group A with a 1-0 win over Australia courtesy of a goal 14 minutes from time from Napoli’s Ezequiel Lavezzi.

Liverpool’s Ryan Babel fired in a rebound from his own header against the United States to put the Netherlands ahead in what ended as a 2-2 draw.

As the English Football league kicked off a week before it’s big brother the Premier, the honour of being first scorer went to Gary Hooper of Scunthorpe who scored after 57 minutes of their tie with Leeds. Leeds, who are League One title favourites came back to win 2-1.

Rangers got back to winning ways as the Scottish Premier kicked off beating Falkirk 1-0. Inverness gained their first ever win against Aberdeen beating them 2-0 at Pittodrie.

Paul Jewell is still waiting for his first league win as Derby manager as they lost their first game back in the Championship at home to Doncaster.

In League Two Dagenham got off to a magnificent start as they smashed six goals past Chester, while in League One Oldham won a seven-goal thriller against Millwall at Boundary Park after being 3-1 down before Millwall’s Robinson was sent-off.

Also in League Two three sides started with minus points, Rotherham gained three with a 1-0 win over Lincoln, Bournemouth drew with Gillingham 1-1, while Luton lost at home to remain with minus 30.

In Scotland new boys Annan Athletic are still unbeaten after their first home league game ended in a 1-1 draw.

Charlton have signed Fulham winger Hameur Bouazza on a season-long loan.

United’s Simpson joins Blackburn on loan

Ruud announces international retirement

England could play as Team GB in 2012

Referee’s could disrupt start of Scottish Premier Season

West Ham are to retire the number six shirt to mark the 50th anniversary of Bobby Moore’s debut for the club. The shirt will be worn for the last time in a memorial game on Saturday. The current number six, Matthew Upson, will then change to wearing number 15.

Blackburn Rovers have captured defender Danny Simpson from Manchester United on a season-long loan.

Real Madrid’s Dutch striker Ruud van Nistelrooy has announced his retirement from international football.

Fifa president Sepp Blatter says he would have no problems if Team GB were to field a football team in 2012 consisting of 11 English players.

The start of the Scottish Premier League this weekend could be delayed because of a strike threat from the country’s Referees’ Association.

Blackburn sign Villanueva to replace Bentley

French Trophee des Champions goes to Bordeaux

Italian’s set to strike

Ferenczi set to return home

Nigeria threaten Marseille

Annan Athletic got off a dream start in their first league match in senior football by sending Cowdenbeath to a humiliating 4-1 defeat at Central Park.

The league newcomers, who took the place of Gretna, turned in an inspired display to take all three points with a devastating second-half performance.

Blackburn Rovers have moved to fill the gap left by David Bentley’s departure by signing Chile midfielder Carlos Villanueva.

The Chilean player of the year has been capped 12 times by his country and has joined Rovers on an initial one-year loan deal from Audax Italiano.

Bordeaux denied Lyon a seventh consecutive Trophee des Champions success by defeating them in a penalty shootout at the Stade Chaban-Delmas on Saturday.

The Italian Footballers’ Association (AIC) on Sunday proposed a strike for the first day of the lower league season and said the opening matches in Serie A and B would start 30 minutes late. Authorities have set a limit on the number of players allowed in squads in Lega Pro, the new name for Italy’s Serie C1 and C2, and the AIC has said hundreds of players are therefore at risk of being made unemployed.

Barnsley striker Istvan Ferenczi will return to his homeland after agreeing to join Hungarian club Ferencvaros.

The Nigeria Football Federation has threatened action against French club Marseille if they do not release defender Taye Taiwo for the Olympic Games in China.

FA charge Joey Barton with violent conduct

French born Bougherra joins Rangers despite WBA interest

Middlesbrough fined for last season’s bad disciplinary record

Doncaster shatter transfer record to sign Mills

Sven picks first Mexican squad since taking over

Manchester City eased past their Faroe Island opponents EB Streymur 2-0 tonight to progress to the next stage of the UEFA Cup. Martin Petrov and Darius Vassell scored the goals that gave them a comfortable home win at Oakwell the home of Barnsley and a 4-0 aggregate win. They will find out tomorrow (Friday 1st August) who they face in the next qualifying round. The crowd just about summed up the occasion though with a paltry 7,334 attending.

The Football Association have charged Joey Barton of Newcastle with violent condut over his assault of former team-mate Ousmane Dabo. Barton was given a four-month suspended sentence for the assault after addimiting ABH. The FA have had to wait until the criminal investigations were complete before charging Barton over the incident which happened while he was at Manchester City in May 2007.

Charlton defender Madjid Bougherra has turned down an offer from West Bromwich to join Rangers for £2.5m. The Algerian centre back has agreed a four year deal with the Ibrox club.

Middlesbrough have been fined £20,000 and a suspended £30,000 after finishing with the worst disciplinary record in the Premier League last season. Gareth Southgate’s men racked up 85 yellow cards and two reds, with George Boateng, who has now moved to Hull City, being the worst offender after being given nine yellow cards.

Burnley, Darlington and Macclesfield were all also fined after finishing bottom of the disciplinary tables in their respective leagues.

Doncaster have completed the Manchester City defender Matt Mills on a three-year deal for a club record £300,000, the 22-year old played 44 times for Doncaster on loan last season.

Mexico coach Sven-Goran Eriksson has included Brazil-born midfielder Leandro Augusto Oldoni in his first squad since being appointed manager in June.The 23-man squad, comprised entirely of home-based players, will meet up as preparation for the third stage of the World Cup qualifiers, which begins on August 20 against Honduras at the Estadio Azteca.

Kevin Taylor

Hull City take Gardner on loan

Diouf makes switch to Sunderland

Muntari goes from Pompey to Italy

Ethiopia suspended by FIFA

Liverpool have completed the signing of striker Robbie Keane from Tottenham for a fee that could rise to £20.3m, the Irish striker has agreed a four-year deal with the Anfield club.
 
Hull City have completed the loan signing of Tottenham defender Anthony Gardner until January.

El-Hadji Diouf has moved to Sunderland for around £2.5m he expressed his desire to leave Bolton Wanderers despite having a year of his contract still left.

Italian champions Inter Milan have completed the signing of midfielder Sulley Muntari from Portsmouth.

Football’s world governing body, Fifa, has suspended the Ethiopian Football Federation with immediate effect. The suspension means that Ethiopia could miss their next 2010 World Cup and Africa Cup League of Nations qualifier at home to Morocco on the weekend of the 5-7 September.

A blog on the AFS wouldn’t be complete without a mention of the News of The World Football Annual that is now in it’s 122nd year according to a proud claim on it’s cover, but this year there’s a new publisher and a new sponsor and the book has been re-launched as the Nationwide Football Annual.

Nationwide have agreed to back publication of the book, which is thought to be the second-oldest sporting annual after Wisden, for the forthcoming 2008/09 season.

The book was launched by former England goalkeeper Peter Shilton.

Nationwide have agreed to back the book for this year, no decision has been made on whether that sponsorship will continue to next year or not as yet.

The book will once again be edited by Stuart Barnes but will now be published by
Randall Northam of Sportsbooks, this year it has 544 pages whereas the first edition 121 years ago had just 16 pages.

For more details, click on the Book Review section on the front page of our site, where the new Nationwide Football Annual is currently available from Amazon for the bargain price of £5.24, plus postage.

It’s definitely on my shopping list.

Hammers sign Behrami from Lazio

Sunderland sign Tainio, Chimbonda next

Blatter says clubs must release players for Olympics

Hull City wait on King

Borussia Dortmund defended their German Super Cup title with a 2-1 win over Bayern Munich on Wednesday night.

West Ham have completed the £5million signing of Switzerland international Valon Behrami from Lazio.

The 23-year-old can play at right-back or in midfield and has signed a five-year deal with the Premier League club after passing a medical.

Sunderland have announced the signing of Tottenham midfielder Teemu Tainio, with Pascal Chimbonda’s arrival expected to be confirmed imminently.

FIFA president Sepp Blatter said on Wednesday that clubs must release their eligible Under-23 players for the Olympic soccer tournament despite the claims of Europe’s leading clubs that they were under no obligation to do so.

Hull City’s bid to sign Wigan’s Marlon King is being held up, the two clubs have agreed a fee but King and Wigan are now discussing the terms of his departure.