The winners…
Tottenham
IT MAY NOT have been an overly busy Transfer Window for Spurs, but all of the moves they did make looked quite astute.
They succeeded in getting rid of two high earners who were getting very little game time — Aaron Lennon and Kyle Naughton — although granted, the former has only gone out a loan.
The club also signed the MK Dons’ highly promising 18-year-old Dele Alli — a youngster likened to Steven Gerrard who’s been coveted by a number of clubs — before immediately loaning him back to the Milton Keynes outfit.
Yet perhaps most importantly, they managed to tie star striker Harry Kane to a long-term deal — a move many critics, including Sky’s Phil Thompson, have described as the best signing of the window.
Of course, Spurs failed to offload mercurial forward Emmanuel Adebayor (largely because they were unwilling to sell to a rival club in West Ham), but overall, Daniel Levy and co will surely be satisfied with how this Transfer Window has panned out.
Eoin Doyle and Michael Duffy
Both these players had a nervous wait yesterday to see if their last-minute deals would go through, and luckily for Doyle and Duffy, they were ultimately able to join Cardiff and Celtic respectively.
26-year-old Doyle, who has already played for Hibs, Sligo Rovers and Shamrock Rovers among others, has scored 25 goals for Chesterfield in all competitions this season, hence his move up a division is richly deserved.
Seldom played as the main striker at Hibs, the rumoured seven-figure sum suggests the Dubliner has a manager who trusts him at Cardiff, and will therefore play him in his best position. Moreover, if he can maintain his excellent form with the Welsh side, a future Ireland call-up seems like a distinct possibility.
In addition, Northern Ireland under-21 international Duffy will be similarly relieved to have signed on the dotted line with Celtic, after scoring 16 goals with Derry City in the League of Ireland last season.
The 20-year-old went on two recent trials with the Scottish club, showing admirable conviction by rejecting the offer of a third one, having already felt he had impressed sufficiently enough to earn a contract at Parkhead.
And he wasn’t the only Celtic-affiliated Irishman celebrating yesterday, with Eoghan O’Connell — cousin of Irish rugby star Paul — penning a new two-year deal with Ronny Deila’s side.
Chelsea
Like most Premier League clubs, Chelsea’s transfer business over the past month has hardly been excessive.
However, in Juan Cuadrado, Jose Mourinho may have signed the final piece of the jigsaw needed for the Stamford Bridge club to enjoy the kind of success that owner Roman Abramovich demands.
The Colombia international showed his talent at the World Cup this summer, racking up the joint-most assists at the tournament alongside Germany’s Toni Kroos. His dribbling skills are also excellent and the 26-year-old, who has joined from Serie A team Fiorentina, is undoubtedly talented enough to earn a regular spot in the Chelsea side.
Elsewhere, Mourinho and co secured an excellent deal for André Schürrle, who they sold to Wolfsburg for £22million — a £4million profit on the fee that originally took the World Cup winner to London from Leverkusen.
Mourinho also managed to offload a number of players who, while talented, were clearly not quite good enough to make an impact at Stamford Bridge — he will thus be happy enough to wave goodbye to Ryan Bertrand, Mohamed Salah (on loan) and Mark Schwarzer.
The losers…
Manchester United
It was always going to be a quiet January for Manchester United following a summer in which several new and expensive players were bought by the club.
However, fans will be disappointed that — Victor Valdes aside — the Red Devils did not make one high-profile signing over the past month.
And with all due respect to Valdes — who has had an excellent career at the top level and brings some much-needed experience to the dressing room — the acquisition of a reserve goalkeeper is never going to get fans overly excited.
It’s being widely reported that Manchester United will wait until the summer to make any more major signings and the policy of patience to ensure key targets are ultimately secured is understandable to a degree.
However, some critics continue to argue that a robust, experienced centre-half or defensive midfielder is needed urgently in order for the Old Trafford outfit to secure the top-four finish that Louis van Gaal almost certainly needs to avoid getting sacked.
That said, while they have endured the odd nightmare, United actually boast the third-best defensive record in the league currently, so perhaps Van Gaal feels the club can live without Mats Hummels or Kevin Strootman (who’s still injured anyway) for now.
However, sometimes a big signing is needed simply to give a club an injection of life, and with United performing far from spectacularly and not much better off points-wise than they were under David Moyes last season, they could certainly have done with some instant inspiration.
Sky Sports News
Widely dubbed the ‘most boring Deadline Day ever,’ Sky Sports News will presumably be disappointed on what is the one occasion when much of the British and Irish footballing world scrutinises them intensively.
Indeed, the channel were even forced at times to admit that’s it was ‘quiet’ in terms of transfer activity, even if reporters and presenters also frequently resorted to misleading stock phrases such as ‘it’s all happening,’ while guest analyst Thierry Henry couldn’t have sounded any less convincing when he described Deadline Day as “good so far”.
Perhaps anticipating the lack of activity, the channel focused more than ever on analysis, with reporters invariably unable to provide info of much interest, though even the likes of Niall Quinn, Phil Thompson and Jamie Redknapp failed to add considerable insight to what increasingly feels like a tiresome process.
The conspicuous absence of fans also accentuated the dreariness of the day – though these unruly supporters’ antics may have been typically unsavoury, their lewd, unpredictable behaviour brought a car-crash value and tension to proceedings that was sorely lacking yesterday.
The sense of desperation was accordingly summed up by the fact that the channel broadcast a live interview in which Harry Redknapp essentially said nothing, only to show a repeat of that same interview just 20 minutes later. Hence, never has a Transfer Window so closely resembled Samuel Beckett’s ‘Waiting for Godot’.
QPR
Speaking of Redknapp, it was fitting that the individual (Jim White aside) who is most synonymous with Sky Sports News on Deadline Day also had a torrid time.
More often than not, ‘Harry Houdini’ improbably manages to pull off several eye-catching deals at the last minute during these always-hectic Transfer Windows.
Yet this time around, speaking to the Sky cameras, Redknapp cut a frustrated figure. Recently heavily linked with Jermaine Defoe, Emmanuel Adebayor and Dani Osvaldo to name but a few, Redknapp ended up with no one come 11pm last night, bar West Ham’s Mauro Zarate (who he signed at the start of the Transfer Window).
For someone who is usually so accomplished at doing late deals, it was quite a surprise that the 67-year-old manager was unable to boost a side so clearly in need of renovation. Consequently, with QPR currently sitting second bottom in the league on 19 points, their survival hopes suddenly seem very tenuous indeed.
Who were your winners and losers from the January Transfer Window? Let us know in the comments section below.
