TOTTENHAM striker Jermain Defoe “is going nowhere” according to his manager, Martin Jol.

ALEX FERGUSON has revealed Tim Howard could still have a future at Manchester United.

ARSENE WENGER accepts Arsenal’s campaign is about to face the “moment of truth”.

REAL MADRID sporting director Predrag Mijatovic believes the possibility of finally winning some silverware with the Spanish giants will lead David Beckham to extend his contract at the club.

JOSE MOURINHO has warned Manchester United the hard work starts here if Alex Ferguson’s men are to hold off his defending champions and take the Barclays Premiership title back to Old Trafford.

BAYERN MUNICH chairman Karl-Heinz Rummenigge has accused Chelsea owner Roman Abramovich of stifling the competitiveness of European football.

ARSENAL expect Thierry Henry to return for Tuesday’s trip to Fulham but manager Arsene Wenger insists they are anything but a one-man team.

ROY KEANE reckons Stephen Elliott could play in goal — and still get his name on the scoresheet.

FOOTBALL and politics are so inextricably linked in Italy that it was no surprise when Silvio Berlusconi fainted while delivering a speech on Sunday and had to be whisked off to hospital for a check-up.

BEFORE Tuesday night’s game at Celtic Park, Gordon Strachan intimated that the Premiership was over-hyped, something I totally agree with him about, and that the SPL wasn’t that far behind it.

IT’S official. He says so himself. Arsene Wenger is a bad loser. He’ll have enhanced the role at the Reebok on Saturday night.

LIKE Martin Luther King, I too have a dream, although I’ll grant you that mine is perhaps a little more modest than racial integration, civil rights for all and the dawn of a shining new era for humanity.

PORTSMOUTH captain Dejan Stefanovic and assistant manager Tony Adams are on a collision course over criticism of the Serbian’s defending.

LIVERPOOL boss Rafael Benitez believes his skipper Steven Gerrard does not fully realise how good he can become.

DWIGHT YORKE has seen a “much calmer” Roy Keane since the Republic of Ireland icon took the managerial plunge with Sunderland.

FRANKLY, it was getting embarrassing. You pay £30m on perhaps the deadliest striker in Europe, yet he has looked more lame duck than lethal of late.

JUSSI JAASKELAINEN has been lauded as a top goalkeeper equal to Chelsea’s Petr Cech and Manchester United’s Edwin Van der Sar.

ALAN SMITH will not allow the mindless acts of a few supporters to affect the gratitude he feels towards Liverpool for their compassion and swift action in dealing with his horrific injury.

FOR Liverpool, and in particular their hardman defender Jamie Carragher, a week of soul searching is not over yet.

NEWCASTLE manager Glenn Roeder has ruled Shay Given out of the Republic of Ireland’s Euro qualifier with San Marino next month.