And relax. At last, it is over. Four months of rabid speculation, frantic dealing, and last-day panicking. Big Ben bonged, and the transferwindow was slammed shut. There is a god.
As usual, the papers were full of a relentless torrent of drivel and information placed there by agents keen to ramp up interest in their players.
The summer was also full of talk of endless swap deals. How many times have you seen swap deals in football? It rarely happens, yet every transfer window we see hundreds of rumours about players swapping clubs, often with some cash thrown in – such deals would be very hard to broker. It does happen (James Milner and Stephen Ireland springs to mind), but not as often as the rumours seem to think it will.
But throughout it all, you could rely on one thing – there would be ridiculous transfer rumours on a daily basis.
The month of May started on an appropriately crazy note, with Nigel Reo Coker’s agent talking of a move to Napoli. On the 4th May, the Daily Mail reckoned that ‘Jose Mourinho is ready to rival Manchester United and Liverpool in the £15m race for Ashley Young’. The Daily Star on the 6th May claimed Manchester City were to bid £30m + James Milner for Gareth Bale. The same day it was reported that Juventus wanted Ipswich striker Connor Wickham and Blackburn defender Phil Jones
On the 17th May, The Mirror reported that City were going in for Christiano Ronaldo. City had previously been linked with Xavi by the same paper.
Off the pitch, and on 31st May it was reported that Craig Bellamy was a leading contender to replace Dave Jones, who was sacked as Cardiff boss after the club’s play-off failure according to the Daily Mail. The Guardian also declared that Bellamy was the favourite to replace Jones.
Next, came the surprise link of Jermain Defoe to Arsenal. Yeah, that was going to happen.
On the 12th June, and the news broke again in the Mirror of Christiano Ronaldo wanting £400,000 a week to join Manchester City, who had sent hima picture of a Bentley covered in money to try and presuade him. Seems perfectly credible to me.
The Metro newspaper, always first with the big stories, reported in mid-June: Manchester City and Chelsea will submit bids for David Villa if Barcelona choose to cash in on the Spanish international forward in order to fund a move for Arsenal midfielder Cesc Fabregas.
The next day, the Mirror said that Blackburn were after Emmanuel Adebayor, as part of a £30m spending spree. How did that go chaps?
Next, at the People, came news of Joey Barton going to Arsenal. Rumours also resurfaced about Marcus Senna going to Swansea.
On the 21st June, the Irish independent reported that Liverpool were one of five clubs after John O’ Shea.
The following day, The Sun brought us news that Barcelona were planning a £27.5million bid for David Luiz.
They claimed: ‘The Brazilian, signed from Benfica, has indicated he might listen to an offer from Barca, but only if Chelsea give their blessing.”
More bizarrely than that was The Daily Mail reporting that Zenit St Petersburg were considering a move for Adebayor.
Then came the most ridiculous story of all, which could never possibly have happened…