And so it begins … again. A rolling, meandering soap opera that never really stops started in earnest on Sunday as the new year heralded the opening of the January transfer window. An often tedious month-long orgy of will-they won’t-they drama, whisper and counter-whisper, unhappy Arsenal fans and sightings of Robert Snodgrass, it slowly builds to a climactic all-singing, all-dancing Sky Sports show-stopper hosted by an enthusiastic Scotsman who wears a yellow tie.
We have been here before, many times. Fourteen, to be precise. Made compulsory by Fifa for the 2002-03 season, the January transfer window is one of two registration periods in which Premier League clubs are permitted to buy players they may or may not have been linked with by assorted TV and radio shows, newspaper gossip columns, football websites and social media accounts run by teenage schoolboys from football hotbeds such as Ludlow and Stow-on-the-Wold. Originally introduced as part of a compromise with the European Commission in order to preserve contractual stability for footballers and clubs while simultaneously allowing movement of the former at certain times of the year, the January window has since eclipsed the League Cup to become the third biggest competition in English football.
Related: Premier League: fans from all 20 clubs make their transfer window selections
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