SOCCER: David Moyes was last night unveiled as Everton's new manager after 24 hours of frenzied boardroom negotiations. Walter Smith's successor must now confront the daunting task of preserving the club's top-flight status.
Moyes has signed a four-year deal worth around £16,000 a week, with Preston's loss tempered by a £1 million compensation package, on a par with the deal struck between Tottenham and Leeds for George Graham in 1999 as the biggest settlement for a manager's services. But Preston will receive a further £500,000 if Everton avoid relegation this season.
The 38-year-old Glaswegian, mobbed by ecstatic Evertonians as he arrived at the stadium, will meet his new players this morning, but will have only one training session to assess their strengths before the Blues play Fulham at Goodison tomorrow. That is the first of nine games in which he must accrue enough points to ward off a first relegation from the top flight in 48 years.
"I don't know how much I can do to influence that game, but I can speak to the players and reassure them," he said. "I'm from a city not unlike this, brought up with Glasgow Celtic and Rangers, and I'm joining the people's football club in Liverpool. The majority of people you meet on the street are Everton fans and I hope to give those fans something to be proud of."
Everton's pursuit of the Scot appeared to be on the brink of collapse earlier in the day because of an impasse over compensation. It took a dash up the M6 by Everton's owner Bill Kenwright for last-ditch talks with Preston's chief executive Tony Scholes to reach a compromise.
Moyes will be handed around £5million to bolster the ailing squad, though he must do so before the looming transfer deadline of March 27th. His priority will surely be a striker. Everton have scored only six goals in their last 13 league games, with Brighton's prolific forward Bobby Zamora - whom Moyes attempted to sign for Preston earlier this season - likely to be his principal target.
Meanwhile, Smith's period of unemployment could be brought to an unexpected close, with the former Everton manager joining the backroom staff at Manchester United.
Alex Ferguson (60), intends to appoint a new right-hand man at the end of the season and is also considering creating a new position of general manager. Jim Ryan has effectively been his assistant this season, but Manchester United have never appointed a direct replacement for Steve McClaren since his move to Middlesbrough last summer.
Arsene Wenger's hopes of winning a second Double received a boost yesterday when Arsenal's captain Patrick Vieira was cleared of violent conduct. Vieira escaped a possible three-match ban for allegedly elbowing Chelsea's Jimmy Floyd Hasselbaink, hours after Leeds' Alan Smith and Mark Viduka were found not guilty of similar misconduct charges.
The verdicts by three-man Football Association disciplinary commissions brought smiles to everyone at Highbury and Elland Road, but will disappoint those inside and outside the FA who called for a crackdown on the use of elbows.
A diplomatic squall blew up between Italy and Turkey yesterday after an extraordinary brawl at the end of Wednesday's Champions League match between Roma and Galatasaray pitted players and officials against police, leaving more than a dozen injured, prompting a UEFA inquiry and talk of criminal charges.
Both countries' authorities blamed each other for the unprecedented sight of players being assaulted in the changing rooms while kicks and punches left colleagues and police in riot gear flat on the pitch.
Turkey's foreign minister Ismail Cem was furious enough to break a diplomatic taboo by claiming that the behaviour of the police recalled the days of blackshirt thuggery and dictatorship. "Watching from television and looking at the newspapers, I thought I was watching the time of fascist Mussolini and the Mussolini police, not Europe in 2002."
The Italian authorities claimed they were the victims of Turkish aggression and did not rule out criminal charges.
