EXCLUSIVE!!!

We understand that Celtic defender John Kennedy is poised to agree a six-month loan spell with Motherwell.  The 24-year-old injury-plagued centre half is expected to fly out with his new team mates to the Austrian training camp tomorrow.

Motherwell went down 2-1 to Romanian side FC Unirea Urziceni in a closed-door game at Bellshill's New Brandon Park this afternoon, with Chris Porter on target for the Steelmen.  Seemingly, Jim O'Brien (see below) impressed when he came on as a second half substitute.

5.25pm

Bob Malcolm has signed a 12-month deal with Motherwell, presumably after every other club he and his agent tried to engineer a move to knocked him back.  Personally, I don't think his performances in the second half of last season merited the offer of a new deal, especially when he'll undoubtedly be one of our top earners, but I guess we'll just need to wait and see what he does in 2008/09.  I'd rather have Keith Lasley in the team ahead of him any day of the week mind you.

It seems we also made an offer to out-of-contract Falkirk defender Kenny Milne, but he opted for English League One side Scunthorpe instead.

The squad leaves for a pre-season training camp in Austria tomorrow, and Mark McGhee has revealed a number of foreign trialists will be joining the first-team in the Alps.  He said:
"We will have a couple of German lads and a Spanish lad who are going to be training with us over the coming weeks.  The Spanish boy has come through the youth ranks with Real Madrid. He has played for their reserve team and has been farmed out to a side in the Third Division over there.  However, he is obviously going to have his work cut out making it at the La Liga champions and is looking for another club. We will see how he gets on.  The German goalie we are looking at is an established player while the centre-half has played in Germany and in Greece. We will see how they shape up. But I am also keen to bring in Scottish and British players." 

McGhee revealed a few more details about the Austria trip when he spoke to the Hamilton Advertiser:
"Everything is going fine in pre-season, the players are back in tip-top condition and they’ve met all the levels that we set them before they went away. We’re really pleased with them.  We start to play football next week and we’re off to Austria on Sunday. Last year’s trip was useful to us but it will be even more important now because we’re involved in European competition.  

"We’ve arranged two games against top-class opposition - one of those is against the Romanian champions - and both will be really hard games.  The game against CFR Cluj will be very constructive because we’re playing against a team who are in the Champions’ League, so that will be good.  We’ll be taking trialists over to Austria with us to have a look at them and we might take two or three, or even three or four players in different positions.  We want to add four players to the squad and that’s why we’re looking at people... we definitely want to expand our squad.

"This coming season we will be under more pressure and the expectations will be different.  Teams will come up against us with a different attitude and will know what to expect now, so that will make it more difficult for us.  But we haven’t set them any great targets – we just want them to do their best and try their hardest."

More transfer gossip.  Reports suggest that Mark McGhee failed in moves to land Charlie Miller and Alan Gow.  Meanwhile it seems that Celtic winger Jim O'Brien, who has enjoyed loan spells at Dunfermline and Dundee Utd, is training with the first team with a view to a permanent deal.

We've also been linked with Millwall 'keeper Lenny Pidgeley.  The 24-year-old former Chelsea trainee joined Millwall on a free transfer from Watford in 2006.

A rather bizarre tabloid story this week claimed that Motherwell had knocked back £300,000 to rename Fir Park as the Real Radio Stadium.  Chief Executive Ian Stillie would only say:
"Real Radio and Motherwell FC have been in preliminary discussion over several potential sponsorship options – the details of which are treated as commercial, and in confidence.  No agreement has been reached at this point in time."

The Daily Record quoted a "club source" as saying:
"With the heritage and history of Fir Park the club felt this was the right thing to do.  It is a different matter if you move to a new stadium, such as when Arsenal's ground was named the Emirates after the sponsors.  But when you have a long-established ground it is important to respect the club's traditions.  The most important renaming at Motherwell this year will be re-titling the main stand the Phil O'Donnell Stand."

Ravenscraig anyone?

It's been confirmed that Villarreal have pulled out of the pre-season match scheduled for August 2nd, apparently because they were looking for a participation fee that Motherwell were unable or unwilling to cough up.  The club hope to secure different opposition for that date.

Ex-Motherwell striker Ross McCormack claims his belief that Mark McGhee won't be at Fir Park much longer was a major factor in his decision to leave for Cardiff:
"The manager made it so difficult with what he did and said.  He had offers in January to leave and we all know Hearts wanted him this summer so everyone was delighted he stayed at the club.  But to be honest I don’t know if he will be at Fir Park much longer because he is a top boss.  It is only a matter of time before he moves on.  He will want to move to a bigger club to progress in his career, like I wanted to.  Maybe in the future I might work with him again; I definitely want to because he made a big impression on me."

The "pay at the gate" price for the Davie Cooper Stand has seemingly risen to a rather steep £22...

Did your season ticket arrive today then?  Mine was delivered at 8.30am by some guy in a white van.