Josep Guardiola has refused to be drawn on speculation linking Barcelona with Premier League stars Didier Drogba and Emmanuel Adebayor.

Reports claim the Nou Camp boss is interested in both Chelsea's Drogba and Arsenal striker Adebayor in a bid to strengthen his side further ahead of his first campaign in the hotseat.

But Guardiola was remaining tight-lipped after watching Barca cruise to a 6-0 friendly win over Hibernian at Murrayfield in his first game in charge on Thursday night.

"I'm not here to speak about them," he said.

"I have many excellent players and I am working with them. All good players are interesting and those players are interesting but there are many, many good players, in England, Germany, everywhere."

Asked whether he was preparing to make a bid, Guardiola added: "I don't know. The sporting director can talk about that better than me."

Eidur Gudjohnsen helped himself to a double and Lionel Messi, Pedro, Bojan and Yaya Toure all claimed a goal apiece in a game where Messi stole the show in the 45 minutes he was on the park.

Guardiola is now seeking a quick resolution over the Argentinian's participation in the Olympic Games in Beijing this summer - a move Barcelona are opposed to.

He said: "(FIFA president Sepp) Blatter has to make a decision because we have been waiting a long time for the decision.

"If he has to go according to the law, he goes. If he is to stay according to the law, he stays."

"But a decision had to be made as quickly as possible."

Ivorien national team star Toure Yaya has reportedly confirmed country mate Drogba's interest in FC Barcelona.


The news of Drogba's discontent with Chelsea FC and his rising interest to play in Spain is old news. However, the story has taken a different and more specific angle since the Chelsea FC big man indicated in a reported press statement that that he wanted to play for Barca. Since then, it's been a constant look in at Camp Nou as a flood of attention from the world press, especially from England has greeted Drogba's alleged confession of a secret admiration and fantasy with life and soccer at Camp Nou. Drogba's team mate in the Ivorien national team, Toure Yaya has now confirmed the interested and love struck Drogba is for real. Toure and Drogba have been having very close talks over the past week, as both are in the Ivorien national team camp for the African Nations Cup in Ghana. Now FC Barcelona player Toure reveals more details from their heart-to-heart discussions:

Drogba loves Barcelona very much and wants to play for the club. He has said this to me and I know he wants to come to Barca. We have spoken about Barcelona, and it all looks very good. Of course, it will be difficult, because Madrid and Milan are also after him. In my opinion, it would be very good if he were to join us, because we have lots of great players and he would be another one of them. He is a player with quality and one that can help the team.

The news of Drogba's imminent transfer out of Chelsea FC is expected to climax this summer. AC Milan, Real Madrid and Inter Milan are all thought to be interested in signing the top scorer at Stamford Bridge.

Fans in Europe show how much they love FC Barcelona star Eric Abidal.



Éric Abidal has been named in the uefa.com users' Team of the Year 2007. The website revealed the 11 best players over the past 12 months. The event, which started in 2001, has remained the same with the website nominating 60 players and users then vote for their favourite eleven. The vote was cast by uefa.com readers, who were given a choice of several players in each position, and the Barça full-back won his place after 3.5million votes were made by 277,985 users. Abidal was the only Barca player picked by the voters.


UEFA Champions League winners, AC Milan, led the way with three players as Kaká, Alessandro Nesta and Clarence Seedorf were included. Liverpool saw Steven Gerrard named, while Chelsea have John Terry and Didier Drogba included. The other players in the team are Iker Casillas (Real Madrid), Dani Alves (Sevilla), Cristiano Ronaldo (Manchester United) and Zlatan Ibrahimovic (Inter), while Sir Alex Ferguson was voted in as manager.

The last has not been heard of the bullish run by the Blues.


After Chelsea's talisman, Didier Drogba stirred the hornet's nest by suggesting he should move to FC Barcelona, the English media have taken over from the Ivorien and sold firstly Ronaldinho, then now Lionel Messi to the Stamford Bridge team in exchange for their top marksman, Drogba. A new entrant in the British press transfer market is now FIFA Best Player for 2008, Kaka of AC Milan. Lionel Messi is the second best player in the world as declared by an official FIFA vote last month, and the gifted left-footer is being coverted by many clubs including Chelsea FC. With a growing interest of Didier Drogba leaning toward FC Barcelona, there's mounting pressure on the officials at Camp Nou to take step toward realizing Drogba's dreams over the summer. No official word has been heard from the Catalan giants, but of course, a deal to sell Messi is non-negotiable, just as much as a deal to sell someone line creative Andres Iniesta who Chelsea also find very suitable for their campaign in 2008/09 season.


This wave of news, rumours and insinuation is a sure appetizer toward the forthcoming European transfer season in Summer this year!

With latest comments from Drogba about pairing Eto'o, the press are once again, awash with Ronaldinho transfer news.



The Brazilian has been in the centre of press-inspired rumours about a transfer away from FC Barcelona and to Chelsea FC after an attempted fix-up with AC Milan did not materialize. Now with the Ivorien goal king at Chelsea, Didier Drogba declaring for a partnership with FC Barcelona striker Samuel Eto'o, the rumour mills have churned out a possible swap deal between Chelsea and FC barcelona which will see Drogba head for FC Barcelona and Ronaldinho head for Chelsea FC. Neither Barca nor Chelsea have yet commented on this latest suggestion from the press, but it may look unlikely that the two clubs may hounour Drogba's wish. The Ivorien may need to be a litle more patient, as any move for him out of Stamford Bridge will have to occur during the summer.


Ronaldinho is still recovering from an injury while replanning his re-introductory strategy to the Barca squad, while Drogba is hoping to upstage Nigeria and Mali as well as host country Ghana and the likes of defending champions Egypt in the African Nations' Cup starting in four days time.