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12 hours ago
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The transfer window at this stage is essentially fan fiction. What if Dr Frankenstein had turned up at Pemberley and conducted a waspish romance with Elizabeth Bennet? What if Akela was not just a wolf but a werewolf? What if famous and attractive Tennis Player X were having a fling with famous and attractive Tennis Player Y? And what if Arsenal actually signed a centre-forward?
There hasn’t yet been time for reality to intervene. It’s like the day after the World Cup draw when everything exists in a realm of pure perfection and you can imagine the platonic ideal of each country facing off, unsullied by form, injury or disputes over bonuses.
Club A needs a left-winger who can cut in on to his right foot, contributing six-to-eight goals a season and opening space for the overlapping full-back. Player B is a left-winger who can cut infield, and therefore this must work, earning Club A imaginary points to contribute towards that absurd modern notion: winning the window.
The truth is that football teams are almost infinitely complex organisms, minute imbalances or frictions potentially having enormous consequences elsewhere. And players are human. Sometimes they struggle to deal with change: new teammates, a new manager, a new environment. No transfer is ever without at least some risk; nothing is ever guaranteed.
Still, the early moves in the market are revealing, if not necessarily for what they may mean for how the title contenders may play next season, then at least for what they say about the state of those clubs and their perceived priorities.
Getting your transfer business done early is one of the supposed markers of a decisive side that knows its own mind, which is good news for the four teams likely to be Premier League contenders – and rather less good news for Manchester United, who have moved to sign Matheus Cunha and Bryan Mbeumo, while struggling to offload any of the half dozen players who are surplus to requirements.
The best time to build, the ancient wisdom has it, is from a position of strength, and Liverpool have done that, bringing in a pair of full-backs and Florian Wirtz at a total cost of around £165m. With Trent Alexander-Arnold gone and Andy Robertson now 31, the acquisitions of Jeremie Frimpong and Milos Kerkez are straightforward enough replacements and suggest the policy of attacking full-backs will remain.
Wirtz is a more complicated case, in part because of his versatility. He could operate as a false 9, or on either flank, but the likelihood is he will be used as a central attacking midfielder as part of a shift to more of a 4-2-3-1 shape than the hybrid 4-3-3/4-2-3-1 Liverpool tended to use last season. That would mean either Dominik Szoboszlai plays less or that he is used deeper at times to add creativity against opponents who sit in a low block.
Given Arne Slot’s lack of faith in Darwin Núñez, a move for a centre-forward was always likely. Exactly what game of bluff and counter-bluff – if any – was being played around Alexander Isak remains unclear but Hugo Ekitike is now the prime target, a mobile goalscorer who should improve Liverpool’s options playing in transition even if concerns remain about his effectiveness when he doesn’t have space to run into.
While there has been interest in Luis Díaz from Bayern, Liverpool’s position on profitability and sustainability rules (PSR) is healthy enough that there is no need to sell the Colombian. Perming three or four from Mohamed Salah, Cody Gakpo, Harvey Elliott, Wirtz, Díaz and Isak or Ekitike marks a significant upgrade on last season.
For Arsenal, after becoming the fifth club to finish as runners-up three years running, there is a sense of urgency. If not now, then when? How many more chances will this side have before the rump needs refreshing? That perhaps explains their targets.
Christian Nørgaard is not especially eye-catching but adds useful defensive depth. Martín Zubimendi should have the tactical intelligence to protect the back four and so release Declan Rice. There will be those who doubt whether Noni Madueke is worth £48.5m, but a winger who can play on either flank makes sense to ease the burden on Bukayo Saka and Gabriel Martinelli.
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The glaring necessity, then, is for a centre-forward, albeit one who shares the responsibility with Kai Havertz, although he may end up dropping deeper at times to relieve Martin Ødegaard. Benjamin Sesko had been the long-term target before Arsenal turned their attention to the older and slightly cheaper Viktor Gyökeres. Given Arsenal almost certainly do need a high-class centre-forward, saving £10m-£15m for a player five years older about whom doubts remain about his capacity to get shots away in tight spaces seems a questionable economy.
Manchester City’s transition continues apace, with the arrival of Rayan Cherki, Tijjani Reijnders and Rayan Aït-Nouri to go with the four players they signed in January. All played some role in the Club World Cup. City’s 4-3 defeat by Al-Hilal in the last 16 does not augur well, but it’s far from clear yet how reliable a guide the tournament will prove.
After all, Chelsea, fourth in the Premier League, won the thing by hammering Paris Saint-Germain, who beat three English sides on their way to the Champions League last season. Have Enzo Maresca’s side really improved so much? João Pedro looks an immediate upgrade on Nicolas Jackson at centre-forward while Jamie Gittens should be a useful addition on the left.
Although a functioning team does seem belatedly to have emerged from the churn, it’s the sheer traffic through Stamford Bridge that is most eye-catching, less the careful accumulation of ingredients than a crazed trolley dash, with a lot of wastage as Maresca assembled his dish.
And that perhaps is the underlying sadness in any discussion of transfers, the way that the game is instinctively viewed through a mercantile lens. It’s never about developing a player or tweaking a system, always about buying the next glossy off-the-shelf solution.
Will any of it work? Who knows? But the feeling is all a little like 2016 after Leicester won the league and Southampton and West Ham finished in the top seven, when the elite went on a spree to reaffirm their status. Eventually, money always wins.
