Top sport stories from the national newspapers:

THE SUN: Liverpool will splash out £20million on Roma midfielder Alberto Aquilani – but only when Xabi Alonso joins Real Madrid. Also: Arsenal look set to sign Salomon Kalou from rivals Chelsea.

DAILY MIRROR: Ricky Ponting vented his frustration at Australia’s Ashes struggles by smashing a dressing-room door at Edgbaston. Also: Joleon Lescott will write a begging letter to Everton to let him join Manchester City.

DAILY MAIL: England flanker Michael Lipman and two former Bath team-mates have been suspended for nine months for evading drug tests, amid accusations by an RFU disciplinary panel that they did so because they feared ’a risk of positive results’. Also: Ricky Ponting last night questioned whether Andrew Flintoff can last the course of a compressed Ashes series after Australia comfortably batted out for a draw at Edgbaston.

DAILY EXPRESS: Sunderland took their spending spree this summer to £23million as they put the finishing touches to Darren Bent’s record-breaking move to the Stadium of Light yesterday. Also: The trio of former Bath players at the centre of a drug storm were last night accused of "hiding behind legal advice" to escape punishment.

DAILY STAR: Joleon Lescott has been told he will NOT be allowed to leave Everton – despite demanding a move to Manchester City yesterday. Also: Andrew Strauss last night backed injury-plagued Andrew Flintoff to be fit for the fourth Test as England look to wrap up the Ashes.

THE TIMES: England are facing another anxious wait over the fitness of Andrew Flintoff after Ricky Ponting claimed that the all-rounder is "going downhill pretty quickly".

DAILY TELEGRAPH: The ring of steel thrown around the Edgbaston pavilion, after West Midlands Police received an unspecified threat yesterday, was nothing to the one erected by Michael Clarke and Marcus North as Australia escaped Birmingham without further defeat.

THE INDEPENDENT: Andrew Strauss remains "very confident" that Andrew Flintoff will be fit to play in Friday’s fourth Ashes Test, despite the fast bowler struggling through yesterday’s stalemate at Edgbaston and often looking like a man in need of a rest.

THE GUARDIAN: The Australia captain, Ricky Ponting, last night landed the first blow ahead of Friday’s fourth Test at Headingley when he claimed Andrew Flintoff’s fitness had gone "downhill pretty quickly" during the course of yesterday’s draw at Edgbaston.