#1 Arsenal and Wenger are the biggest losers. Sold their leftback. Sold their right winger to a rival. Offering £95m for Lemar reeks of desperation. Retained their disillusioned talisman whose will to play is now questioned, and will be available for free next summer. Surely a scramble for his signature ensues in January. I wonder how Lacazette is feeling. Too bad Atletico’s ban was upheld if not he’ll be there and Griezmann would be at United.
#2 Financial Fair Play is a load of rubbish. Impossible for PSG to have enough income to support the acquisition of £198m Neymar and £166m Mbappe. Insane amount of money for just two players. And with Dembele costing Barca £95m, Pogba looks cheap now and Ronaldo felt like a bargain. So it’s good for United, because it means the world record transfer fees have been broken multiple times in one window.
#3 The past record monies paid for Ronaldo, Bale and Pogba took a long time for the clubs to negotiate and a long time for the fans to come to terms with. But these days and probably from this point on, we won’t even bat an eyelid or flinch when the numbers soar above £90m. But the craziest thing about it is that clubs have to pay upwards of £30-40m for average players! Really makes £34m Bailly, £38m Mhkitaryan, £34m Shaw and £32m Herrera look affordable.
#4 Liverpool is trying to do to Saints what Barca is doing to them. The £120m price quoted for Coutinho is good, so they are silly to retain a demoralised player. Could have reinvested that amount in other places. Salah is a shrewd signing but Ox is a strange one – where is he going to play? And honestly, Keita who? £48m for an unknown that can’t even play now? I’m also shocked they haven’t strengthened their leaky defence. With such figures floating around (like £70m for VVD), Pool fans have lost their moral high ground to criticise United’s spending, or Pogba’s price. Oh, and Klopp selling Sakho tells us that he rates him higher than Lovren and Matip. Wonder what Pool fans think of that.
#5 You can’t help but to feel bad for Chelsea (okay, not really). Got rejected by Lukaku, Oxlade, Llorente (and Matic), and now, even Barkley. Imagine that. It’s unimaginable how sad their allure is as reigning EPL champions. I truly wonder how “first priority” Rudiger, Drinkwater, Zappacosta, Morata and Bakayoko are.
#6 Everton did well in the transfer market, for United, that is. They signed “legend” Rooney who still sleeps in Toffee pajamas, Sigurdsson just before we played Swansea, and signed a former United youth player. With so many former United players already there, they feel like a United B team.
#7 Tottenham did well too, to hold on to their star players while managing to get £52m for Walker, £17m a-piece for Wimmer and Bentaleb, and sign £12m Llorente and £23m Aurier for prices that actually reflect their market value. Levy has always been impressive in that way. Annoying, but so effective. Can no longer bully Spurs to sell.
#8 City, managed by Fraudiola, has spent £160 m on a backline that doesn’t even look inspiring. £46m for Walker, £52 for EPL-unproven Mendy, £36m for EPL-unproven Eder, and £27m for EPL-unproven Danilo and selling their ONLY youth product from last year tell me that Pep has been severely overrated as a manager who is reputed to develop players. And him not getting Alexis while unsettling him means it’s a win-win for all of us.
#9 While this may sound like an ugly baby phenomenon, I honestly think United are the biggest winners of this window. First time in a while we are not panicking on Deadline Day. Unlike Moyes who has no clue, and LVG who has a scattergun approach, Jose looks like he knows what he’s doing. Got an established EPL champion to play the position we’ve been missing, releasing Pogba for rampage. Got an established EPL goalscorer to plunder against weaker sides, solving the unceasing home draws we had last season. Re-signed our charismatic talismanic top scorer as a supersub. And best of all, we kept De Gea for another season. I still think United has overpaid for all their players this window but in context of an insane market, the prices seem reasonable.
#10 I tried to be objective but I will admit that there’s a bit of bias and some trolling in this post. I’m expecting some backlash. Ha. Let’s talk football. International friendlies are a waste of time. Gonna be a quiet weekend. Peace out.
