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Newcastle ‘have to believe’ in star-studded Champions League group – Eddie Howe

Eddie Howe has told his Newcastle players they have to believe they can top their Champions League group after being pitched into battle with three of Europe’s giants.

Chelsea and Man City make moves as EPL spending hurtles toward $3 billion in window

LONDON: English Premier League spending was hurtling toward a staggering $3 billion in a record outlay during European soccer’s summer transfer window on Friday. Manchester City and — of course — Chelsea were among those making moves on a typically frantic deadline day. Chelsea were leading the unprecedented splurge, with the arrival of 21-year-old winger Cole Palmer from City for 40 million pounds ($50.7 million) taking the west London club’s spending in this window to around $500 million. In the three transfer windows under their new American ownership fronted by Todd Boehly, Chelsea have spent about $1.15 billion on players mostly signed up on long contracts in an innovative way to spread “amortization” costs of transfer fees. By comparison, the $260 million outlay by City, the English and European champion, look modest. The fourth and final arrival in the window came on deadline day and was Portugal international Matheus Nunes from Wolverhampton, a ball-carrier costing $67 million and providing extra depth in central midfield. Central midfielders were also priorities for Liverpool and Manchester United, who were attempting to tie up the signings of Ryan Gravenberch from Bayern Munich and Sofyan Amrabat from Fiorentina, respectively, in the final hours of the window. It was a busy day for United, which signed left back Sergio Reguilón on loan from Tottenham as cover for the injured Luke Shaw and goalkeeper Altay Bayindir on a transfer from Fenerbahce to back up Andre Onana.

Hojlund could make Manchester United debut against Arsenal

Rasmus Hojlund is fit to make his debut this weekend and Erik ten Hag says Sergio Reguilon could feature at Arsenal after his deadline-day loan switch from Tottenham.

Spain legal panel opens case against suspended soccer chief over World Cup kiss

MADRID: A Spanish government legal panel is opening a case against suspended soccer chief Luis Rubiales, the state news agency Efe said on Friday. Rubiales has come in for a storm of criticism and calls for his resignation for kissing a player without consent after Spain won the recent Women’s World Cup final in Sydney. FIFA has already suspended Rubiales for 90 days while it studies the case. Spain is looking to remove him independently of the FIFA process. Rubiales is the president of the Spanish Football Federation and a vice president of UEFA. Efe said the legal panel said Rubiales’ behavior would be studied for two possible cases of serious misconduct. The government hoped the panel would recommend very serious misconduct, a category that would allow the state’s sport body to ban him provisionally with a view to eventually declaring him unfit to hold the job.