Bayern To Sell Ribery To Chelsea

GERMAN League's Player of the Year and Bayern Munich's forward, Franck Ribery, could become a Chelsea player next season if Roman Abramovich could part with 31million pounds. Chelsea's Chief Executive, Peter Kenyon, has already made contact with Bayern about the midfielder's proposed move to Stamford Bridge but a decision will not be made until the end of Euro 2008. Ribery has emerged as one of Chelsea's top three transfer targets this summer - AC Milan's midfielder, Kaka, and Liverpool's striker, Fernando Torres, being the others. But Chelsea will have to pay in excess of 31milion pounds to sign the French midfielder. Bayern Munich's new coach, Jurgen Klinsmann, clearly wants to keep Ribery, voted German football's Player of the Year at the Bundesliga champions but the midfielder is well aware of Chelsea's interest. Despite Bayern's initial resistance, Chelsea is prepared to pay more than the 30.8milion pounds it spent on Andriy Shevchenko two years ago. Ribery, who scored in France's 1-0 victory over England in a friendly in March, moved to Bayern for 16milion pounds last summer on the back of a successful season with Marseille (he was voted Player of the Year in France in 2007) and he arrives at Euro 2008 in top form. Kenyon is also in negotiations with Milan about former World Player of the Year, Kaka, and Chelsea has been encouraged by Liverpool not rejecting out of hand its initial approach for Torres. Though Kaka signed a contract at the San Siro earlier this year and claimed that he wanted to be "immortalised" in the same way as Paolo Maldini, Milan's failure to qualify for the Champions League has altered his position. Milan is ready to sign Didier Drogba, and the Kaka deal could be linked to that. Milan's Vice President, Adriano Galliani, said: "Chelsea have authorised us to begin negotiations with Drogba. Unfortunately, Chelsea will not sell Shevchenko."