The football world may still be reeling from the fall of its chief, its head, its guiding light in the dark night, as we all contemplate what life will be like without Sepp Blatter’s steady hand at our tiller, but some things are constant. Even as a world’s lonely eyes turn to Zurich, the unstoppable force of the Rumour Mill ploughs on, like a massive nonsense combine harvester, churning up everything in its path and making us all ponder what exactly it is we’re doing here.
If the fall of Fifa’s head honcho won’t do it, the Mill wonders what exactly it would take for the gossip-mongers of football to grind to a halt. An act of God? A bizarre, implausible but widespread mass cramp in typing fingers? A collective existential crisis where they all simultaneously realise they’re desperately unhappy and retire to grow geraniums on the coast somewhere?
Whatever would stop it, it hasn’t happened today, so let’s embrace the tittle tattle. Today the noble men and women who whisper in our gossip-hungry ears tell us that Real Madrid and Manchester United might as well just get a flat and create some sort of wacky sitcom for all the time they’re going to be spending together this summer. For apparently, according to no less a source than “reports in Spain”, United have made an offer of £110m for a brace of Real’s talented bunch, specifically Raphaël Varane and that Gareth Bale chap, but were grumpily dismissed by the Spanish big boys, either as an attempt to increase the tension and thus hilarity between the two for the good of this situation comedy, or because Real just don’t want to sell those two. For you to work out, that one. All in the subtext.
Real aren’t just confining their attentions to one bit of Manchester, mind. While City aren’t exactly wacky neighbours to rival Cosmo Kramer, they are popping up in this whole sorry affair, if only to rebuff attempts from Real to sign Sergio Agüero, who himself will somehow turn down the chance to work with Rafa Benítez. So think of City more as Deborah from Men Behaving Badly, with Real being Tony.
Meanwhile, in the latest will-they, won’t-they saga, United are playing Rachel to Real’s Ross, as they still refuse to do what the viewers are hoping by setting David de Gea free to move to Madrid. De Gea has already declared his intentions, according to those nose-tappers in the know, and his status has even upgraded from “looking at houses in the Madrid area” to “has said goodbye to his United team-mates”. Hugo Lloris and Asmir Begovic are the names you’ve already read a million times suggested to replace him.
Away from that zany pair, despite Diego Costa declaring that contrary to recent rumours he rather likes life in London and doesn’t want to take a trip on Do One Airlines, Chelsea are going to make a £30m offer for long-time Arsenal target Gonzalo Higuaín, perhaps just for yucks or to annoy their North London counterparts. And, frankly, there have been far worse motivations for transfers before, so we’re all for that. Perhaps more plausible is talk that Antoine Griezmann is the man Chelsea really want (despite competition from Bayern Munich), the Atlético Madrid flyer the latest they want to fill their equivalent of Spinal Tap’s drummer, namely the position of fourth winger/forward, as it looks like Juan Cuadrado will follow André Schürrle, Mo Salah, Kevin De Bruyne et al in leaving Stamford Bridge before anyone really notices they’re there. Arsenal, for their part, will console themselves at the loss of Higuaín by making a move for Geoffrey Kondogbia, although Monaco are apparently playing hardball on that one.
Moving back to Chelsea and United, in a segue that could have been more artfully done earlier on but we’re too far in to change now, those two will duke it out for the Atlético defender Miranda, whose contract expires next summer and will presumably spend the interim giving “what am I like?” looks to camera before falling over in a slapstick manner.
The Mill doesn’t expect you to believe everything you read in the papers, or indeed in the Mill, so we ask you to willingly suspend your disbelief for this plot twist: Tom Cleverley is a man in demand, as Aston Villa AND Everton want him when he becomes a free agent this summer. Weird, eh? In other “if Louis van Gaal never sees them again it will be too soon” news, Internazionale are seriously considering a move for Nani, while Lazio are joining the chase for Premier League rejects by sniffing around Liverpool’s Fabio Borini.
Elsewhere, Tottenham are keen on Giannelli Imbula of Marseille who in turn are keen on Benjamin Stambouli of Tottenham, Hull will ask anyone interested in James Chester to cross their palms with £10(ten!)m worth of silver, Stoke are looking longingly at Yevhen Konoplyanka, Bayern Munich are no longer in the Ilkay Gundogan hunt which will presumably set off some sort of ALERT at Manchester United and Arsenal, while Monaco have set Dimitar Berbatov free into the world, which is a kind way of saying they’ve released him because they can’t afford his wages.
