Ban? What ban? Chelsea going for Timo Werner (The Sun)

Chelsea is counting on its transfer ban being lifted, and if and when that happens, they have big goals! Current manager Frank Lampard wants a handy backup to Tammy Abraham, so why not sign the second-highest scorer in the Bundesliga?

Frank Lampard has made a back-up striker to Tammy Abraham his top target, with Bournemouth star Callum Wilson and RB Leipzig hitman Timo Werner both on the club’s radar.

SunSport understands the club’s legal team believe that the Court of Arbitration for Sport will suspend or even quash the second one of those.

New evidence has been presented in their defence for an appeal, as well as an argument based on Manchester City escaping punishment for similar infringements.

It’s obviously a very good argument (for a corrupt organization) that if one person gets away with murder, another one, should, too.

PSG and Neymar in stalemate (Calciomercato)

The ultimate dysfunctional marriage, Neymar and PSG, just cannot work things out. Neymar’s contract expires in 2022, and even though PSG wants to be rid of the semi-useful superstar (he has missed half of PSG’s games since he joined), they still want to make a boatload of money back off of selling him. That means a contract renewal would be ideal.

Paris Saint Germain and their star striker Neymar have hit a brick wall in their contract renewal negotiations, according to a report from today’s paper edition of the French newspaper Le Parisien via Calciomercato.com.

The 27-year-old Brazilian forward’s contract currently expires in 2022, negotiated when he joined the club from Barcelona in the summer of 2017 for a fee of €222 million (via BBC). However, the Parisian club’s management are evaluating the situation due to the player’s inconsistent playing time.

Maradona is coaching Gimnasia La Plata in Argentina... and it’s weird (The Athletic)

Argentinian soccer legend Diego Maradona is back coaching again in his homeland, and it’s about as crazy as you should expect of Maradona by now. His club, Gimnasia La Plata, even created a second mascot in his honor, a monstrous plush Maradona:

Photo by Marcelo Endelli/Getty Images

It resembled a scene from a particularly nightmarish children’s theatre production. Or maybe just from a nightmare. Along the touchline they walked, the wolf and his new friend. ...his sidekick bore a look of foreboding emptiness. He also had a huge, Easter Island head and gravedigger hands. He was irredeemably creepy. And that was before his giant eyelids started opening and closing like a ventriloquist’s dummy’s.

Maradona got to work quickly: he had a priest bless the players and exorcise the “bad energy” of the past months. He also banned the color green, which he considered unlucky, inconveniencing the players who happened to wear green cleats.

And you won’t believe his post game celebration dance in the locker room:

A historical penalty decision in Kiel vs Bochum

This is reportedly the first such penalty call ever in the Bundesliga. VAR alerted the referee to the irregularity, and he duly awarded a penalty. Despite the fact that Kiel thus conceded a the 1-1 equalizer, they went on to win the game 2-1.

Today in Bayern: cow goes rogue (Deutsche Welle)

A rampaging cow prompted German police to deploy a helicopter with thermal imaging abilities after the animal ripped through a Bavarian town. The cow attacked its owner, smashed a greenhouse and damaged a patrol car.

They eventually corralled the cow in an alley and brought it down with a tranquilizer dart from a blowgun. Yeah.

Phil Coutinho called up to play for Brazil

Bayern’s own Coutinho has been called up (“convocado”) yet again for Brazil for their upcoming friendly matches against neighbor Argentina and South Korea.

David Alaba so fresh and so clean

David Alaba is proud of his new haircut. Here he is training with fellow fashionistas Jerome Boateng and Serge Gnabry.

Leicester honor their deceased chairman with scarves, 9-0 torching of Southampton

On the anniversary of the chairman Khun Vichai’s untimely death in a freak helicopter accident, Leicester honored his memory with scarves for the fans prior to kickoff. On Friday, the team utterly destroyed Southampton (currently coached by former RB Leipzig coach Ralph Hasenhüttl) 9-0 away. It is the biggest away win in the Premier League ever and tied Manchester United for the most lopsided win.

And Zlatan will be Zlatan (Zlatan)

In what was likely his last moment as an MLS player LA Galaxy star Zlatan Ibrahimovic kindly took a moment out to kibbutz with some fans of cross town rival LAFC after his team was knocked out of the playoffs 5-3 in the highest scoring game in MLS playoff history.