Staying Put: In what appears to be the fulfilment of his worst-case scenario, Fabrizio Ravanelli will be playing his football in the English first division this coming season. As things stand this morning, Ravanelli remains a Middlesbrough player and will be available for selection for the home game with Charlton Athletic on August 9th.
However, in this increasingly tiresome saga, there is still time for Ravanelli to move to another club prepared to cope with his stupendous wage demands. Everton remain favourites to save the Italian from trips to Bury, Reading and Crewe, but after three hours of negotiation with Bryan Robson at the Riverside Stadium yesterday, there was no announcement of an imminent move to Merseyside.
Instead Middlesbrough issued this statement. "Fabrizio Ravanelli is returning to Middlesbrough and will commence training with the team tomorrow. He is looking forward to the start of the new season and is fully committed to Middlesbrough FC."
New Arrivals: Paul Ince was unveiled as Liverpool's latest signing yesterday. Describing Ince as "a significant signing", Roy Evans paid the 29-year-old a further hefty compliment when the Liverpool manager said: "I don't want to tag him a hard man, but he has a similar mentality to Graeme Souness and Steve McMahon because he wants to win. It is an attitude he will bring and spread among us."
Ron Atkinson may have moved upstairs at Highfield Road, but his presence is still clearly felt judging by Roland Nilsson's arrival at Coventry yesterday for £200,000 from Helsingborgs. Nilsson, now 33, has signed a two-year contract. This will be his second spell in English football: Atkinson signed the Swede when he was manager of Sheffield Wednesday. Murdo MacLeod has been appointed as assistant head coach to Celtic manager Wim Jansen. The former Partick Thistle chief, who was sacked by the first division club last season, is promoted from second team manager at Parkhead. MacLeod's first duties will be undertaken as Celtic take on Inter Cable-Tel Cardiff in Wales today in the UEFA Cup qualifying tie.
In The Clear: Ian Wright will not face disciplinary action by the Football Association following the latest allegations of misconduct made against him. The Arsenal striker, whose career has been punctuated by a long list of misdemeanours, allegedly made derogatory remarks to a linesman after he failed to give what the player thought were two fouls during Arsenal's League Cup tie against Norwich in 1993. However, the FA stressed they would be taking no action against Wright because there was a dispute about exactly what happened in the incident. "It was felt there was a difference in the version of events between what Richard Saunders said and what the referee said," said the FA spokesman Steve Double. "It is now over and done with."
Money Talk: Inter Milan were told by football's governing body FIFA yesterday that they would have to pay more than the $27.6 million they thought had secured the release of Ronaldo from Barcelona. FIFA Players' Status Committee chairman Gerhard Mayer-Vorfelder said the 4 billion pesetas Inter paid to buy out the Brazilian's contract did not constitute a transfer fee. He said if the two clubs could not come to an agreement by Thursday, July 31st, then FIFA would impose a fee.
