MONTEVIDEO — Uruguay striker Luis Suarez has said he will stay at Liverpool, despite being unsettled at the English Premier League side and seeking a transfer, El Observador newspaper said Wednesday. “Right now, because of all the affection of the people, I'll be staying,” the 26-year-old was quoted as saying in an interview from Japan, where Uruguay played a friendly in Tokyo. Liverpool has had two bids from Arsenal rejected and Suarez has been made to train on his own by manager Brendan Rodgers after accusing the club of breaking promises by refusing to let him leave. On Tuesday, captain Steven Gerrard said he would hate to see Suarez leave Anfield and he was confident that he would not be joining another English club. Suarez has scored 51 goals in 96 games for Liverpool after joining from Dutch giants Ajax in January 2011 but is keen to leave to fulfil his Champions League ambitions. UEFA expels Metalist Kharkiv from Champions League UEFA disqualified Metalist Kharkiv from the Champions League Wednesday for links to match-fixing in Ukraine and reinstated its previous opponent, PAOK Thessaloniki. World football's most prized club competition has further legal issues with another team, Fenerbahce, also fighting expulsion over a years-old domestic match-fixing case as it prepares to play Arsenal in the playoffs next week. Metalist will challenge UEFA's verdict with an urgent appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport, and can ask for the sanctions to be frozen while the case is processed. “We regret that such a sanction was applied, and we do not agree with it,” Metalist first vice president Konstantin Pivovarov said in a statement. The Ukrainian club had been scheduled to travel to play Schalke next Wednesday in the first leg of the playoff round, after eliminating PAOK 3-1 on aggregate in the third qualifying round last week. UEFA President Michel Platini led an emergency meeting Wednesday which decided that the Greek club will now go to Germany instead. The return match is on Aug. 27, with the winner advancing to the groups draw in Monaco two days later. Metalist finished as runner-up last season to title winner Shakhtar Donetsk, breaking Dynamo Kiev's lock on the second entry allocated to Ukraine in the elite competition. — Agencies
