8/3/2019 1Chopra Signs for Sunderland

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ellamy can take Hammers to a new level Gabbs

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Gabbidon believes 7.5mning Craig Bellamy canWest Ham United towardsan football.

Welsh captains transfer fromol to Upton Park was sealeday.ans Bellamy will now joinice-captain Gabbidon as wellnational team-mate Jamesin the claret and blue strip.

Its a great signing for the cluband shows that this coming seasonwill be dramatically different to last,where we escaped relegation by awhisker, said Gabbidon.

Craig is a tremendous player andexcites people and he will be a greataddition to the club.

He is the type of player who can

push the club to the right end of thetable, hes an intelligent player andthat will rub off on everyone.

Id rather have him onboard than play against him.

Gabbidon says Bellamycan be the fulcrum of theteam from now on.

He added: He willno doubt take us to adifferent level.

He gives us a different optiongoing forward which was perhapsmissing last term.

Both me and Ginge(James Collins) have already

taken some stick over thelast couple of days from

the London lads.We are already

known as the WelshMafia.

Jones: 5m fee is good businessCARDIFF City have sensation-

ally agreed to sell MichaelChopra to Sunderland for a

club record 5m, we canre v e a l .

The striker, con-sidered the crown jew-el of the Bluebirdsteam, is flying out fromCitys pre-seasoncamp in Portugaltoday to hold talkswith Sunderland man-ager Roy Keane aboutpersonal terms.

I am sorry to seehim go, everybody inthe camp is, Citymanager Dave Jonestold the Echo.

But at the end ofthe day there is a

price for every player. Themoney could go on to make uss t ro n g e r.

This is good business for usand after all, we are in a business.And for Michael it means Premi-ership football we cannot stophim. We wish him all the bestwith Sunderland.

It will be a major surprise if thedeal does not go throughsmoothly and it significantlyimproves the chances of RobbieFowler coming to Ninian Park,with City now in position to meetthe financial requirements of an8,500-a-week wage packet for

the former Liverpool striker, plusbonuses.

The Chopra package was dra-matically put together late lastnight.

City initially rebuffed an offer of3m for the player, but whenanother call came back upping itto 5m, manager Dave Jones andchairman Peter Ridsdale decidedit was too good to turn down.

City will rake in a huge 4.5mprofit on Chopra having signedhim from Newcastle for just500,000 last year.

And the funds will be put to-wards team strengthening.

Fowler remains the numberone target, but Jones now hasammunition to look elsewhere ifthe ex-England star turns Citydown.

CLUBRECORDFOR STAR

Terry PhillipsChief Sports Writer

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