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That icy wind rattling the rafters is the cold reality of what follows the closure of the transfer window, a hungover pall of regret. Despite £3.5bn shelled out in the men’s window, several things will not be happening in the Premier League when they might have been. When Arsenal host Chelsea for a most super of Sundays, Vinícius Júnior will not be playing in their attack, and neither will Gabriel Martinelli, whose lengthy social media disgrace farewells on his departure for Saudi Arabia pointedly made no mention of Mikel Arteta.
Re: yesterday’s Football Daily. Perhaps Messrs Vardy and James thought they had booked Jasper Carrott to kick off their hilarious podcast party. And got the not-so-funny doppelganger Mike Dean instead?” – Jim Arrowsmith.
With Premier League clubs now owned by a motley assortment of hedge funds, petrostates, billionaires and so on, perhaps the time is right to take a leaf out of pro cycling’s book and name the teams after their owners and sponsors. It will be a regular reminder to fans that the football entities they support are far removed from the community-based groups of like-minded individuals that the word ‘club’ denotes, and that they are instead cash-cow playthings of the mega-rich. As for me, I’ve been a fan of Fosun International Debet since they were known as Bhatti Brothers Manders Paints and Inks” – Neil Withers.
As someone who likes watching football rather than wasting time on transfers, this week has been boring, to say the least. Not so dull that it’s been enough to pick up a book, mind, but still. However, the result was that, after finding out that West Ham have a midfielder called Engels, I was sent down an internet wormhole and discovered that there is also a Brazilian midfielder called Marx Lenin (his real name, not just a nickname). Now, if only we could get them to play together, we would have something. Revolutionary tactics, no one in the centre or on the right wing, everyone on the left (a bit like Arsenal circa Henry, Pires and Ashley Cole), etc” – Noble Francis.
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