Sunderland are close to signing the former Newcastle striker after agreeing a reported £5million fee with Cardiff.We Got It Wrong - Chopra IS Going To Sunderland!
Sunderland are close to signing the former Newcastle striker after agreeing a reported £5million fee with Cardiff.Chopra, signed a £500,000 deal with Cardiff last summer, is to discuss personal terms with Black Cats manager Roy Keane.
City manager Dave Jones: "I am sorry to see him go, everybody in the camp is. But at the end of the day there is a price for every player. The money could go on to make us stronger.
"This is good business for us and after all, we are in a business. And for Michael it means Premiership football - we cannot stop him. We wish him all the best with Sunderland."
On leaving Newcastle he had a furious outburst at "players who have never always given 100% to Newcastle United, like Albert Luque and Patrick Kluivert, but I ALWAYS did".
He also said: "The happiest moment of my time at Newcastle was scoring that goal against Sunderland at the Stadium Of Light in the 4-1 win, as you could tell by my goal celebration".
It was Alan Shearer's last ever game, and he too, enjoyed the day: "The injury ended my career, but what a way to go out ... scoring against Sunderland on their own patch!"
Chopra Heading For The Premiership
By Nu Mad Tuesday 10th July 2007
A "mystery" Premiership club has tested Cardiff chairman Peter Ridsdale's resolve to hang onto ex-Newcastle striker Michael Chopra by slapping in a bid of £3m.
Ridsdale insists there is no need for the club to sell players in order to make movements in the transfer market, but at that time no club had made an offer for their star player.
Suddenly that has changed. Watford made a bid of £2m last week, but that has been overshadowed by this move. Cardiff still won't say who made the offer, but you can rule out Sunderland, they ruled it out immediately.
Boss Dave Jones has so far added three players to his squad this summer, signing defender Tony Capaldi, midfielder Gavin Rae and forward Steven MacLean.
But Ridsdale is adamant there are funds in place for more transfers, he said:
"There is money available for Dave (Jones) to spend, irrespective of people being sold.
"We've shown there's money there. We paid £500,000 for Chopra last year and in January there were fees for Peter Whittingham, Jason Byrne and David Forde.
"The difference now is that we will flatly refuse to pay over the odds for players anymore.
"We will pay what we think is a fair price. If that means we have to be patient then that's how it will be."
Monday April 17th 2006
SUNDERLAND 1 NEWCASTLE UNITED 4
SUNDERLAND: Davis, Hoyte, Caldwell, Danny Collins, McCartney, Lawrence, Whitehead, Miller, Daryl Murphy (Arca 64), Stead (Kyle 68), Brown.
Subs Not Used: Joe Murphy, Breen, Leadbitter.
NEWCASTLE UTD: Given, Carr, Bramble, Moore, Babayaro, Solano, Faye, Clark (Chopra 59), N'Zogbia (Boumsong 88), Dyer, Shearer (Luque 71).
Subs Not Used: Harper, Ramage.
Att: 40,032
It was an outcome which looked unlikely at half-time as the Toon players trudged off the pitch trailing to Justin Hoyte's 32nd-minute strike having been completely out-played and out-fought by Kevin Ball's men. The battle of the caretaker managers, and Roeder had some work to do to put some fighting spirit in his team, because that first half was a joke. Players without the bottle to put a foot in ... adding an extra step in the challenge for 50/50 balls ... nobody wanting the ball.
The game represented Sunderland's last chance to salvage any pride from a disastrous season, and their task could not be under-estimated: they had not won a home derby in 10 attempts stretching back 26 years, and with the Magpies having won their last three league games on the trot to rekindle hopes of European qualification, they knew a first league win on their own ground would take a major performance.
The game turned on its head within seven incident-packed minutes when Chopra equalised from close range after the home defence made a mess of clearing Bramble's long ball. The goalkeeper was fooled by the kid's refusal to give up a lost cause and United were level.
Two minutes later, the Sunderland defence still rattled, Charles N'Zogbia was hauled back by Hoyte inside the box and referee Chris Foy pointed to the spot. Shearer, having converted penalties against both Tottenham and Wigan in the last fortnight, blasted his effort beyond Davis' dive to claim his first (and last) ever goal for the club at the Stadium of Light.
The Mackems were stunned into silenced, and their players fell to the floor in disbelief at the turnaround. But their misery increased with 66 minutes gone when N'Zogbia worked his way into the box and slid a left-foot shot past Davis and inside the far post. A marvelous goal made out of nothing, easily the pick of the bunch.
Shearer's afternoon ended prematurely with 19 minutes remaining when he was heavily tackled and fell to the ground in a heep. The GOALden Boy limped off to be replaced by Albert Luque, and the Spaniard scored number four as he broke through to go one-on-one with the goalkeeper.
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