Remember when you used to get together with your pals in the playground to trade football stickers so that you could complete your album? Well that’s what today is like, except on a grander scale, and with actual footballers! And, of course, we’re not doing the trading, just sitting in front of our screens waiting to find out who’s got the best deals and which chumps will emerge from all the haggling still with empty spaces in their albums and a pile of duplicates of certain players. For the sake of suspense, let’s pretend we don’t already know that Arsenal will be one of them.
Mind you, there are rumblings that suggest Arsenal are about to get seriously busy. A move for Paris Saint-Germain’s Julian Draxler is said to be in the offing. Then again, an Arsenal move for Draxler has reportedly been in the offing since long before he was a PSG player so maybe expressing an interest in the silky German is just some kind of Arsène Wenger verbal tic.
The fact that many players are already away on international duty adds another layer of intrigue to today’s to-ing and fro-ing, and the Algeria Football Federation have been witty enough to play along: they have announced that Riyad Mahrez has been given permission to leave the Desert Foxes’ training camp for their World Cup qualifier with Zambia “in order to complete his transfer to his new club”. Which club is that? They didn’t say, the cheeky teasers! And the Algerian media would only add that Mahrez is leaving Leicester to join “a European giant”. Does that include Everton? How about Arsenal? Both of those have been identified as possible destinations but the favourites are Barcelona and Chelsea – and there’s even a suggestion that Manchester United may make a late return to the market to land a player they don’t really need but whom several of their rivals do.
If Mahrez or Draxler do end up at Arsenal, then the chances of Alexis Sánchez being freed to join Manchester City will surely rise.
Meanwhile, Tottenham Hotspur are plotting to turn the tables on Chelsea and avenge years of last-gasp gazumping by the Stamford Bridge club: Mauricio Pochettino has edged in front of Antonio Conte in the race to sign Swansea striker Fernando Llorente. Swansea are hoping to quickly nab a new striker, albeit one who has looked clapped out in recent times – they are confident of restoring Wilfried Bony to his form of yore.
With Liverpool refusing to lower the price of Mamadou Sakho despite making it plain that they want him gone, Crystal Palace are thinking of switching targets and are homing in on Manchester City’s Eliaquim Mangala, who could be replaced at City by West Brom’s Jonny Evans, assuming Arsenal are unsuccessful in their attempt to hire the Northern Irishman whom they should have hired years ago.
West Ham are planning to get their season back on track and introduce a bit of stability to their team by signing ... Jack Wilshere. That’s some quality blue-sky thinking there.
Everton have registered an interested in another player with links to Arsenal and an unfortunate injury record: Thomas Vermaelen. The Belgian centre-back is currently somewhere on the books of Barcelona.
Finally, of course, at some point today we’re going to find out whether Liverpool have landed Virgil van Dijk or spent the entire summer waking Southampton’s neighbours in vain with their relentless door-pounding. And their serenading of Thomas Lemar will either become music to Monaco’s ears or remain an irritating whine.
Speaking of irritating whines, today is the day that Chelsea could finally put Diego Costa out of their misery.
It’s going to be fun, friends. Stay tuned!