Liverpool outbid Blackburn for £6m Emerton

Liverpool are making a £6m offer for Feyenoord's powerful Australian Brett Emerton and aim to sign him by the weekend. Their manager, Gérard Houllier, hopes to beat off competition from Blackburn Rovers to sign the right-sided player, who can can play wide or at wing-back.

Blackburn had a £5m offer rejected in the past few days while Leeds and Middlesbrough are interested in Emerton.

Graeme Souness has already strengthened his squad by signing the Turkish midfielder Tugay Kerimoglu from Rangers for £1.3m. He has now been granted a work permit, allowing him to join the club on their tour to Austria and Germany.

Michael Owen led Liverpool to a 3-1 victory over Thailand yesterday, scoring twice in the first half of their friendly. Owen opened the scoring with a header, Thailand's Thanaichai Boriban equalised with a powerful right-foot shot but before half-time Owen made it 2-1. Nick Barmby added Liverpool's third after the break.

Gaizka Mendieta became the most expensive Spanish player ever when Lazio agreed a £30m fee with Valencia for the midfielder, who will complete the move after a medical today. The deal dwarfs the previous highest fee of £12m paid by Barcelona to Valencia for the midfielder Gerard last summer, and by Milan to Atletico Madrid for Jose Mari midway through the 1999-2000 season.

Barcelona top the list of 16 seeded clubs going into today's draw for the third qualifying round of the Champions' League. The other top seeds are Lazio, Parma and Liverpool, who have all qualified automatically for this stage.

Porto's Paraguayan midfielder, Carlos Paredes, is likely to miss their second qualifying round tie against Barry Town after picking up an ankle injury in the 1-0 friendly defeat of Celtic on Tuesday.

Manchester United's Jonathan Greening and Mark Wilson will have talks with Middlesbrough today about a £4m double deal. Greening is rated at £2.7m in the move.

Tranmere Rovers' speedy winger Andy Parkinson is set to sign for Norwich City in a £500,000 deal today.

Aston Villa's new £5m central defender, Olof Mellberg, will miss Saturday's Intertoto Cup third-round match against Slaven Belupo at Villa Park because he was registered too late after his move from Racing Santander. Villa trail 2-1 from the first leg in Croatia.

Brazil were 45 minutes away from Copa America elimination until the 10-man defending champions came from behind to beat Paraguay 3-1 on Wednesday. Trailing 1-0 at half-time, they were rescued by three late goals.