So what does a Rumour Mill do two days after the transfer window closes? Does it pack up its bags, shuffle off to a quiet corner somewhere, read a book or repair the ghosts of meaningful relationships that once upon a time it had? Does it get out of the office and into the sunshine? Does it quietly acknowledge that this is no longer the time for gossip and hearsay and respectfully knock it on the head for a little while?
NO! ABSOLUTELY NOT! THIS DOES NOT SLIP! EXACTLY THE SAME! WE GO TO NORWICH AND WE GO AGAIN!
José Mourinho is a man who plans, and having carefully assessed his Manchester United team over the opening weeks of the season has already decided who he needs to buy next summer. And that someone is Antoine Griezmann, the Atlético Madrid colt who most learned professors of the game have concluded is “quite good at football”, and who Mourinho apparently thinks could replace Wayne Rooney at some point soon. Whether anyone has yet asked Griezmann if this is a good idea yet is not clear.
Speaking of Mourinho, it seems he tried to stuff wee lil’ N’Golo Kanté into a sack and take him to Old Trafford, before the Frenchman decided being shouted at by Antonio Conte was preferable to all that noise. “It was amazing to have Mourinho call me, even though I’d been warned before how he would appeal to me,” said Kanté, calling to mind rose petals on the bed, tasteful lighting and oysters. “I listened to his arguments about why I should move to United. But at that time I was hesitant between staying at Leicester or leaving for Chelsea.” Another man to supposedly turn United down was Barcelona’s Ivan Rakitic, but don’t feel too bad United: he invited Chelsea and Juventus to do one too.
And on the subject of players who nearly went somewhere but didn’t, how ‘bout that Paul Pogba, eh? Apparently Barcelona passed up the chance to sign Manchester’s new favourite son, that’s according to their “director of sporting relations” Albert Soler, anyway. “Last year we reached a deal with Juventus for us to have a priority option when they sold Pogba,” he said. “This summer we decided that there were players that suited us better on a sporting level. The idea of the board was that nobody would be able to get ahead of us in the market. It allowed us to have options.”
Chelsea have Kanté and David Luiz, but it doesn’t take a platinum-plated genius to work out the latter was at best their second choice. Legendarily loquacious Napoli head honcho Aurelio De Laurentiis reckons Chelsea went big for his defender Kalidou Koulibaly, offering the following non-sequitur: “Chelsea came in and offered €50m [£42m] for Koulibaly, but he’s going away for the Africa Cup of Nations, which pollutes the national Leagues and is another load of Fifa nonsense.” OK.
Liverpool kicked the tyres of Borussia Dortmund flyer Christian Pulisic this summer, but don’t fear, they will be back for him when the next transfer window ekes itself open. They will, so the story goes, go back in for Pulisic and Borussia Mönchengladbach midfielder Mahmoud Dahoud, but it all could depend on whether they can offer Champions League football, so next summer looks like the time for that particular deal.
Meanwhile, Sunderland are scrabbling around in the dirt after getting very few of their transfer targets over the summer, a balls-up compounded by news that Fabio Borini might be out for the foreseeable. They’re pleading with Fifa to let them take Boavista goalkeeper Mika on loan, with Vito Mannone and Jordan Pickford both on the boo-boo couch, while they’re assessing the cupboard marked “free agent strikers” to solve the problems up top. That cupboard does look rather bare, mind, as it contains Victor Anichebe, Emmanuel Adebayor, 217-year-old Dimi Berbatov and – you’ll like this, Mackems – their old pal Nicky Bendtner.
A few other odds and ends here. Gabriel Agbonlahor looks to be heading to Aston Villa purdah after turning down a deadline day move to Reading. Hal Robson-Kanu turned down all the cash from China before signing on at West Brom. Although life doesn’t exactly seem to be sweet at the Hawthorns right now. And finally, such is life in the Premier League at present that a team can recruit someone just so they can keep a player they actually want company: apparently Crystal Palace could sign Jonathan Benteke, brother of, on a free transfer after he left S.V. Zulte Waregem, but have no intention of playing him in the first team.
