Chelsea to hand Lyon's Essien ?70,000-a-week

Chelsea have offered Olympique Lyon ?20 million for midfielder Michael Essien. Essien's agent Fabien Pireteaou is on the brink of tying up a ?70,000-a-week contract and Lyon's new coach Gerard Houllier is resigned to losing him to the Premiership champs in the next few days.

Indeed, Pireteaou revealed yesterday that he expected to make an announcement about Chelsea's bid for his client on Monday.