Sports News

By Peter Smith

Sport now and hard on the heels of the Frantisek Chvalovsky case, yet another top personality in Czech sport has been arrested on fraud charges. As you may have heard in the news, Roman Zubik, the owner of one of the country's top hockey clubs, Vsetin, is accused of credit fraud.

The arrest is all the more notable since earlier this week Vsetin finally triumphed over Slavia Prague to set up an Extraliga Final series against Sparta.

Turning to football and the English First Division leaders Fulham are reported to have agreed a L9.5 million deal with Anderlecht for the Czech striker Jan Koller. This contradicts statements made by the Belgian champions earlier in the week denying that contact had been made with Jean Tigana's side concerning the sale of their hottest property.

The player himself is reported to be very eager to join the London club. "Fulham are very ambitious," Koller commented. "The chairman wishes to do well in the Premier League and wants the players that are able to achieve that." For their part Anderlecht seem to have accepted that Koller will leave for England in the summer. Coach Aime Anthuenis told reporters 'What kind of crazy coach would attempt to block a player from earning the kind of salary that he's been offered?'. It has been reported that the Czech forward has been offered a four-year contract with Fulham worth at least one million pounds a year.

Koller first moved to the Belgian League in 1996 and spent his first three seasons as a regular goalscorer for Lokeren. He continued to be one of the league's leading scorers after his transfer to Anderlecht in 1999 and earlier this year was voted the Belgium's Player of the Year.

Finally onto tennis and one result from the $140,000 Porto Open women's tournament in Oporto, Portugal. It was a short affair for the Czech player Adriana Gersi, as she went out in the first round to the unseeded Spaniard Torrens Valero 6-3, 6-3.