This Summer’s Transfer Window is a Theme Park to be Enjoyed

Football Transfer Land edit

With players and managers switching up clubs across Europe, Greg Johnson argues that in the absence of a fixture list this summer is an attraction in its own right

Forget your suitcase, sun cream and tickets to paradise. With the major leagues of Europe settled for another season, there’s only one holiday resort for spectators marooned in the summer sun without their weekly football fix.

As the contents of the gossip columns bubble up and spill out into headlines and speculative editorials, it feels almost like the transfer hype-machine has become self-aware with supercharged anticipation. And while it’s easy to dismiss football’s fallow months as “silly season”, this summer’s transfer window is set to be a veritable theme park of landmark signings and thrill ride rumours.

Ignore the cartoon-fronted micro-nations of pleasure built on the swamps of Florida and dig in for June, July and August. With the full roster of the Premier League richer than ever, tensions growing between the established elite and their potential usurpers, and a palpable sense of change sweeping through the dugouts of Europe, for once the off-season looks likely to deliver on the preposterous horse-trading usually reserved for football fantasies and video games.

Welcome to Football Summer Transfer Land, the theme park resort where fan and agent dreams of ridiculous deals come true before your eyes. A Twitter account rather than a plane fare is all that’s required to make the trip: visitors needn’t even leave their homes. Continue reading