O'Connor switches to Birmingham

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Newly promoted Birmingham City have signed Scotland striker Garry O'Connor to play in the English Premiership next season, his current club Lokomotiv Moscow announced.

O'Connor will join the Midlands side for £2.65 million ($5.29 million) subject to a medical, Lokomotiv said.

Birmingham manager Steve Bruce has been scouting for new strikers to bolster his side's chances of staying up next season following the return of loan forward Nicklas Bendtner to Arsenal

He was unsuccessful with a bid for West Ham's Marlon Harewood earlier in the week.

Fulham, Everton and Portsmouth were also linked with the former Hibs player, who scored 58 goals in 164 appearances for the Edinburgh club.

The 24-year-old O'Connor has been in good form recently, scoring the only goal in Scotland's friendly victory over Austria and finding the target in the 2-0 win over the Faroe Islands in a Euro 2008 qualifier.

That followed a period of exile, which began when he was axed by former boss Walter Smith for failing to rejoin the squad after the party were given a night off ahead of a European Championship qualifier against Ukraine.

He had struggled to settle in Moscow but signed off from Lokomotiv with the winning goal in the Russian Cup final last month.

Euro rivals denied points

Two Euro 2008 Group A matches between Armenia and Azerbaijan have been cancelled, with both countries forfeiting the chance to contest the six qualifying points available, European soccer's governing body UEFA said on Saturday.

The neighboring countries have been involved in a long-running dispute over land. Armenia wanted the games played on a normal home and away basis but Azerbaijan refused to play host to the Armenians and proposed a neutral ground for both encounters.

"As no suitable compromise could be found between the two associations it was decided to cancel the two matches, namely Azerbaijan-Armenia scheduled for September 8 and Armenia-Azerbaijan scheduled for September 12," UEFA said in a statement following a meeting of its executive committee in the Netherlands.

"It was decided to award both associations zero points."

Ukraine, Switzerland, Austria and Spain had been mentioned as possible neutral venues for the games but this was not agreeable to either side.

Azerbaijan are bottom of the group, with five points from eight matches, while Armenia have seven points from seven outings. Poland lead the group with 19 points from nine games.

Portugal, Serbia, Finland, Belgium and Kazakhstan make up the rest of the group.

UEFA also decided at its meeting in the Dutch town of Herenveeren to allow Israel to play some of their matches in stadiums outside Tel Aviv.

"The executive reviewed the security situation in Israel and agreed to allow matches to be played not only in the Tel Aviv area but also in internationally recognized stadiums outside the region, namely Haifa, Jerusalem and Ashdod," UEFA said.

Israel are joint leaders with Croatia in Group E with 17 points from eight matches. Croatia have a game in hand.

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