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Teenage striker Matěj Vydra has joined Serie A side Udinese from Baník Ostrava on a five-year deal, the ČTK news agency said on Monday, quoting his agent Ondřej Chovanec. Ostrava will get around four million euros (roughly five million US dollars) for the player, which makes him one of the most expensive Czech footballers ever, the agency said. The 18-year-old, who only made his first appearance in the Czech first division in January, scored four times in 14 matches for Ostrava. Vydra, who passed his medical examination at Udinese last week Thursday, expressed surprise over how quick the deal came together.

The party’s former leader Mirek Topolánek was not present at the conference but sent an open letter analyzing the party’s election defeat and making recommendations for the future. He said that the main reason behind the failure was party infighting, a lack of loyalty and corruption scandals. He reminded the assembly that the party’s own deputies had helped bring down the government in the middle of the country’s EU presidency and said that he himself had been under constant attack from his own party members during his eight years as leader. Mr. Topolánek called for the party to unite and rally around its new leader, to effect a change of guard which would bring capable, young people to the fore and to show greater humility in the face of the public.

Hundreds of people attended a commemorative ceremony on Sunday on the site of Ležáky, one of the two Czech villages that the Nazis razed to the ground 68 years ago in retaliation for the assassination of Nazi governor Reinhard Heydrich. The children were either transported to concentration camps or resettled with German families whilst all 52 adults were killed and Ležáky was razed to the ground on June 24th 1942, just two weeks after the destruction of Lidice. Speaking at the ceremony President Vaclav Klaus said it was important for future generations to learn the lessons of the past, to realize the full meaning of expressions such as statehood, freedom and sovereignty and be ever ready to defend them.

Four Czech tourists who were injured in a bus accident in Croatia early on Saturday remain in hospital in Pule with fractures and concussion, the ctk news agency reports. Six others have returned home. Twenty-one passengers suffered injuries in the accident in which a tourist bus overturned into a ravine. There were no critical injuries. Most of the group later continued on their journey to their holiday destination. The accident happened on the seacoast, near the town of Novi Grad at around 4 am CET. According to Croat traffic police the driver had been going too fast on a dangerous stretch of the road.