Roman will spend wisely

Clearly this is a man with deeper pockets than anyone else in English football history. He makes Jack Walker and Mohamed Fayed look like street urchins in comparison.

If Abramovich decides that money is no object, he could change the entire ecology of Premiership football, paying transfer fees and wages which not even Manchester United could match.

He could go head-to-head with Real Madrid for the priciest players in the world. But will Abramovich choose that route?

Until last week, Chelsea were in serious financial difficulties, carrying a vast burden of debt. Abramovich can solve the debt crisis, but the fundamentals of the business will remain the same: a 42,500-seat ground and an international profile that still lingers behind the giants of Manchester and Madrid. Why would he want to pile massive additional costs onto a structure that has already been proven to be weak?

You could argue that Abramovich can power Chelsea into a new financial league. He's certainly paid out big-time on his hockey team in Omsk, luring top players to the bleak wastelands of Siberia with offers they could not refuse. If he can get big names to Siberia, he won't have any trouble bringing them to Fulham Broadway.

But I've never met a rich man who likes paying over the odds. In business, Abramovich buys low and sells high. If those Tottenham reports are accurate, he's not willing to spend a penny more than he has to in football, either.

The game is slowly restoring a degree of financial sanity. Clubs are keeping their wallets shut. Desperate agents may see Abramovich as a man they can fleece for big bucks that aren't on offer elsewhere. But where's his percentage in being the biggest sucker in town?

It's going to be fascinating to watch Abramovich making his presence felt. Meanwhile, I'm fascinated by reports that he's set aside a bunch of Chelsea's £1m executive boxes for his London-based Russian chums. I suspect we're talking some heavy-duty men and seriously gorgeous women. Forget what's happening on the pitch at Stamford Bridge. I'd kill for an invite to one of those boxes.

Tim human beside a freakish Federer

At the beginning of Wimbledon I suggested the proposed players' boycott of next year's tournament would never work because most of the seeded men were such nonentities we'd never know they were missing. Well, scratch Roger Federer from that list. He's got the mark of genuine sporting genius: he does things that seem physically impossible.

Seve Ballesteros used to find the green from ridiculous positions. Zinedine Zidane does tricks you can't quite figure out. Now Federer can hit shots no one else can even imagine. He brings pleasure back to a game grown stale.

Federer's demolitions of Roddick and Philippoussis proved that Tim Henman's exit was an irrelevance. He wasn't going to win Wimbledon anyway, and he's never going to. But give the guy a break. It's not his fault British fans have seized on him as their only hope. Henmania and Henman-bashing have become equally tedious. We're entering a new era. So forget Tim and settle back for a few years of Andy and Roger. With names like that, they could practically be British anyway.

Mother-in-law can show she's no dope

The Tour de France has sadly set off without Raimundas Rumsas, of Lithuania, who was third last year. Hours after the finish, his wife Edita was stopped by French police as she drove back to the family home in Italy. Her car contained numerous performance-enhancing drugs.

Edita said the drugs were for her sick mum. A few weeks ago, however, Rumsas tested positive for EPO during the Giro d'Italia, and is now facing a two-year ban.

Still, if mum-in-law was shovelling down all those chemicals, they should simply bung her on Raimundas' bike. She'd be a cert for Queen of the Mountains.

Feelgood factor is deserting Denise

Denise Lewis has taken terrible flak for her association with the former East German coach, Dr Ekkart Arbeit, who was once a prime mover in his country's policy of stuffing young athletes full of dodgy substances.

Quite apart from the debatable morality, Lewis is making a mistake.

Here's an Olympic champion with a fantastic, very marketable image: successful, beautiful, articulate, likeable, female and black.

But if she's tainted by association with communism's Dr Feelgood, her value will plummet. Then again, maybe he really has renounced his old ways. Judging by Lewis's mediocre display at an event in Tallinn, Arbeit certainly wasn't slipping her anything performance-enhancing.