Source: Daily_Mail
Tevez set to sign for Manchester City but will Terry and Eto'o follow striker to Eastlands?
Manchester City expect to successfully fight off competition for Carlos Tevez and unveil him on Tuesday.
Sources at Eastlands are convinced they have beaten off interest for Tevez from Chelsea to land the former West Ham and Manchester United striker for £25.5million.
And City are also quietly confident they can tie up deals for John Terry and Samuel Eto'o before they jet off to South Africa on a pre-season tour on Wednesday.
City chief executive Garry Cook flies back to Manchester this weekend after attending Robinho's wedding in Brazil and will spend Monday putting the finishing touches to the Tevez deal before turning his attention to Terry and Eto'o.
Chelsea, however, are themselves keen to have Terry's future resolved before they head off on their preseason tour of the United States on Thursday.
Terry had brief discussions with Roman Abramovich's closest aide, Eugene Tenenbaum, on his return to training on Thursday but more serious talks with either chief executive, Peter Kenyon, or even Chelsea's billionaire owner are planned for early next week.
It seems they will have plenty to discuss with City, who are poised to raise their bid for Terry to £35m while offering t h e Chelsea and England skipper £200,000 a week to join Mark Hughes's squad.
The official line from Chelsea remains that they do not wish to sell Terry and that their skipper wants to stay.
However, much could depend on whether they are prepared to boost the 28-year-old defender's £130,000-a-week wages by around another £20,000.
Should Terry opt to stay at Chelsea then he is likely to appear at a press conference alongside his new manager Carlo Ancelotti ahead of the trip to the States.
If not, then there exists the possibility that Terry could be joining his new City team-mates in South Africa.
The case of Eto'o is also providing very real cause for optimism at Eastlands. According to reports in Spain, the Cameroon striker has turned down the chance of a two-year contract extension at the Nou Camp and is ready to leave this summer rather than see out the remaining year of his current deal.
And while Eto'o is still hopeful either Manchester United or AC Milan will enter the fray, as yet City's £25m proposal is the only concrete offer that Barcelona have received.
In addition, neither United nor Milan are willing to match City's wage offer to Eto'o of £180,000-a-week after tax.
Eto'o is currently on holiday in New York, but City are keen to have a deal in place with the pro-lific marksman even if he joins up with their tour at a later date.
Meanwhile, Robinho's marriage to childhood sweetheart, Vivian Guglielmetti, in Guaruja, Brazil on Thursday afforded the City star the opportunity to reacquaint himself with his former employer, Santos president Marcelo Teixeira.
And although Robinho left the Brazilian side in acrimonious circumstances, Teixeira wasted no time trying to talk the skilful forward into a return to the Sao Paulo-based club.
'Now that he is married and calm, it will be easier for him to return to play at Santos,' he said.
'It is a plan that both he and I have. I wish he could return to the club as soon as possible.'
Such claims were no doubt taken with a pinch of salt by City chief executive Cook, who was joined by a star-studded collection of Brazil stars at the ceremony, including Robinho's Eastlands team-mate Elano, £56m Real Madrid man Kaka, former Arsenal forward Julio Baptista and his national team boss Dunga.
Money issues aside, Terry is also understood to be concerned at the lack of serious movement by Chelsea in the transfer market, with Yuri Zhirkov their only major capture of the summer along with youngsters Ross Turnbull and Daniel Sturridge.
The fact that City are in the market for players of the calibre of Tevez and Eto'o, having already landed Roque Santa Cruz and Gareth Barry, is certainly a statement of intent by their hugely wealthy Arab owners and may prove just as appealing to Terry as the cash on offer at Eastlands.
