Man City to spend big on Rodri replacement in January?

Those of you who joined this newsletter the last couple of months could be excused for any confusion about the name of the thing [“The Transfer Flow”] and the utter lack of transfer coverage you have seen.

But the lack of transfer coverage in September and October is because we’ve been protecting you. Kim and I are the meat shields that keep away the horrible, endless fluff some people are forced to report during the early months of the season, because that is their entire business. In place of deeply unhealthy and frankly specious transfer “news” during this period of time, we chose to deliver game, team, and player analysis on par with the best you can find anywhere else in the world, for free.

And in return, we simply ask you to click on a link occasionally, or maybe if you like gambling, sign up to the Premium analysis tier. It feels like a decent exchange, really.

But the leaves are falling off the trees now, which means one thing: the January transfer window season is upon us. And THAT means… rumours are back.

We’ll do these weekly for a couple of more weeks until things get warm and toasty in December, and then we’ll switch back into our whirlwind coverage of the madness AND try and keep up the game analysis without killing ourselves.

(I only started this thing in June — how the fuck am I supposed to know how it’s going to go for the rest of the season?)

Rumours and News

• We’ll start with the big one that the January whole market may teeter on - Manchester City are allegedly close to agreeing a 1-year extension with Pep, which would likely mean they are going to be aggressive in the January market and potentially fuel everyone else’s moves in the process. A couple of big money fees would provide market liquidity during a window most teams have chosen to sit out recently. And more importantly for us, the rumour volume would reach a fever pitch, which is what helps our content flywheel go round.

• Martin Zubimendi is allegedly high on the list, and he’s a fine option, but I would be surprised if there weren’t a LOT of potential target’s CFG is sussing out right now. They have a very robust group that works across the largest multi-club network in the world, and I’d be surprised if they didn’t have a few more targets at least as good in their sights. Pep will obviously have final say.

• Joshua Zirkzee’s agent — who was very prominently involved in all the rumours around his move this past summer — is making sure his client’s name is front and center again. As I pointed out on BSky this morning, his metrics haven’t actually been that bad, but only returning one goal at this point in the season if probably a visible hole in the resume.
  
  My perspective here is that he’s done enough for Amorim to give him a decent chance in the squad for the rest of the season and reassess in the summer. This is especially true since his skillset is fairly flexible and he’s a problematic physical matchup for just about everyone.

• Christopher Nkunku’s agent is also shopping him. The worry about Nkunku hasn’t really been about performance — his underlying numbers in a short stint at Chelsea are quite good — but more about availability. His real problem is Nico Jackson has been fairly awesome and blocking his path to Premier League minutes. The agent likely realises this, knows Nkunku turned 27 last week, and is looking for one more big money pay day for his client.

• Speaking of Chelsea strikers, Samu Omorodion is one of the rare young players who escaped their clutches this summer. And just look at what that likely cost them!
  
  Instead of a £30m striker who at 20 years old is one of the most exciting young talents in Europe, you now see a… £70m(?) striker who at 21 is going to be one of the most exciting young talents in Europe. Poor Chelsea — to play the young talent collection game correctly, you gotta catch ‘em all!

• Crystal Palace have allegedly approached Chelsea’s loan factory, checking to see if Mykailo Mudryk is available and can transition from beating Conference League defenders 1v1 to helping them stave off relegation. Feels believable and almost sensible?

• Rosenborg’s Sverre Nypan turns 18 next month, and the midfielder is on a list of “Most_Coveted_Attacking_Midfield_talents.xlsx” for every big team in Europe. Man United are allegedly in the driver’s seat for the next Martin Odegaard, and they should probably move for him. But they should also remember that they need to find a LOT (read: YEARS) of playing and development time for him somewhere (like Odegaard had), and also not forget that Kobbie Mainoo is 19 and currently a member of their squad.

• I think the funniest news of the last week was Palmeiras president Leila Peraira quashing the idea of a move for Neymar. “Palmeiras is not a medical department. I won’t accept signing a player who is unfit to play.” For the few of you who are not huge Saudi PL fans, Neymar has wracked up a whopping 42 minutes on the pitch this season, and is most likely to move to Santos, if he does move back to Brazil.

• Alphonso Davies, out of contract blah blah blah.

• Jonathan David, out of contract blah blah blah.

• Victor Osimhen is too good for Turkey and needs to move to a real league blah blah blah.

• Napoli still both do and do not want to sell Kvara next summer. Look, some of this shit never goes away, and is just filler for the outlets that need stories to fill the space every day.

• Oh, and Viktor Gyökeres is constantly in the news about a potential move to Manchester United. But not until next summer. And he could also go to some other team. Because Gyokeres’ agent has been doing this for like 7 years now, we just treat it as noise until something concrete shows up, and when it does, we’ll tell you.

Man, this felt good. Expect another one of these next week. —TK

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