Roman Pavlyuchenko's agent expects the Tottenham striker's future to become clearer this week after he revealed he is set for talks with Roma.
Pavlyuchenko has made no secret of his discontent at White Hart Lane in recent weeks and has been linked with a number of clubs across Europe. Roma are favourites to win the race for Pavlyuchenko's signature and the out-of-favour striker could head to the Italian capital in January if upcoming talks prove fruitful.
"We're meeting Roma for Roman," Oliver Wendt said.
"Roman wants to leave London and he wants to go to Roma. If Tottenham allow him to go, Roman could be a Roma player."
Heynckes keen for Kroos to stay
Bayer Leverkusen boss Jupp Heynckes is keen to keep on-loan Toni Kroos at the club beyond the end of the season.
The 19-year-old attacking midfielder, who is on a season-long loan from Bayern Munich, has enjoyed an impressive start to the campaign, helping Bayer to top the Bundesliga.
Heynckes believes Kroos should stay at the BayArena.
"In my opinion, a further year here would do him good," he said.
"Then he can still go back to Bayern. Here he can best continue his development."
Marquez extends Barca contract
Mexican international defender Rafa Marquez extended his contract with Barcelona until 2012.
"I'm happy to renew with a club where I've felt very wanted, where I've enjoyed myself and where I've suffered," he said.
Marquez, whose contract was due to expire in June 2010, joined Barcelona in 2003 from French side Monaco. Barcelona gave no financial details except to say that Marquez's buy-out clause remains unchanged at €100 million.
He joins Eric Abidal, Yaya Toure, Victor Valdes, Pedro Rodriguez, Lionel Messi, Puyol and Andres Iniesta in renewing their contracts with Barcelona.
Racism part of civil society - Lippi
Italy coach Marcello Lippi insisted that racism was not a problem in Italian football but a problem of society.
The 61-year-old's comments come after Juventus were last week fined €20,000 for racist chants their fans directed at Inter's Italian-born striker Mario Balotelli, whose parents are Ghanaian.
But questioned on the subject by students during a visit to Vicenza, Lippi, who lead Italy to the 2006 World Cup title, said: "In Italy there is no case of racism in football.
"Racism is a problem which isn't part of our make-up. It's part of civil society, but unfortunately you have to talk about it when ten or 20 idiots want to make themselves heard in a stadium."
Benzema escapes unharmed from crash
Real Madrid's French striker Karim Benzema escaped unharmed after he lost control of his car and collided with a security barrier and a tree over the weekend.
The player, who turns 22 later this month, was on his way home from Real Madrid's 1-0 Spanish league defeat to arch-rivals Barcelona when the accident happened in the suburbs of the Spanish capital, reports said.
Benzema was driving at speeds of less than 50 kilometres an hour when the accident occurred and the airbags of his Audi were activated, sports daily AS said.
He was introduced with half an hour remaining at the Nou Camp on Sunday night as Real surrendered the top spot in La Liga to the defending Spanish and European champions.
60 matches fixed in Germany - report
More than 60 matches have been fixed in Germany's second division and lower leagues, broadcaster ARD reported, citing a witness while a third division player was sacked after admitting to wrongdoing.
The public prosecutor in Bochum last month indicated that 32 suspect matches had been identified. However, ARD's investigative programme Fakt quoted a witness from Hamburg (of Serbian origin) that more matches were involved and that a second division side had been relegated as a result.
Third division side Sandhausen said meanwhile it had dismissed a player, Marcel Schuon, following the Bochum investigation which indicated wrongdoing while he was playing for Osnabruck.
City dwarf United on agents fees
Manchester City have proved a golden goose to agents as they top the list of agents fees paid out from October 2008 to September 2009.
City paid out nearly £13m in agent fees far more than city rivals Manchester United, who paid £1.5m.
In all, agents benefited financially to the tune of £70.7m with newly-promoted Burnley the lowest spenders at £500,000.
It is the first time the figures from Premier League clubs have been published after they followed the example set by the Football League, who began to publish annual spending reports five years ago.