Luke Moore: Five Things to Look Out For on Deadline Day

31Jan 2013

Betfair

Transfer Deadline Day is upon us! Luke Moore earmarks the things you should be looking out for throughout the day...

Jim White

Perma-tanned-grinning-waxwork-from-a-dystopian-future Jim White is Sky Sports' go-to guy on Deadline Day. Sort of like a rubbish version of sending the bat signal up in Gotham City when there's trouble, Sky presumably send an industrial-sized delivery of fake tan, hair gel and a £50 voucher for Tie Rack round to White's house before chucking him a cab to Sky Towers every six months.

It's his female sidekick I really feel sorry for though. Forced to 'enjoy' his woeful puns, muck-eating grin and knowing winks to the camera, his poor co-presenter can't escape the horrendous drudgery apart from a few sparsely-scattered advert breaks that she presumably spends scratching at the bear-trap that's keeping her at the desk.

Jim White is essentially like an annoying uncle at a wedding insisting that everyone 'cheers up' or 'has a dance'. We don't want to have a dance Jim, we just want you to leave us alone. Go and have another sausage roll.

Token Adult hanging around a Premier League football ground

When Sky Sports News throws to a God-forsaken reporter whose job it is to stand outside a football ground all day in the vague hope that the club in question might actually sign someone, it is normal to see plenty of ne'er-do-well teenagers hanging around making a nuisance of themselves. So far, so 'Broken' Britain. Nothing unusual about that, I used to loiter with intent all the time as a kid. But occasionally, just occasionally, there's a token adult there as well. Two questions immediately spring to mind: 'What is he doing there?' and 'Why does he look so sad?'

The nadir finally came in the summer of 2011 when a Stoke fan and later crowned King of the Token Adults decided to use his five minutes of fame to stand on camera in a tracksuit top and brainlessly roll a cigarette with cold, dead eyes like a shark (see below). When you think about it, that's actually perfectly normal. He obviously had absolutely nothing else to do. Might as well have a snout, eh. His reaction to Stoke's signing of Wilson Palacios was even better.

That said, it's the aforementioned reporters I feel sorry for; at least the Token Adult doesn't have to speak to Jim White.

Harry Redknapp talking through a car window

Picture the scene: Harry and Sandra Redknapp are in the market for a new car. The car salesman is taking them round the particular automobile that's taken their fancy, going through the usual specifications - horse power, engine size, fuel economy etc.

'Never mind all that', says Old 'Arry, '...'ow fast does the windah go dahhhhhn?' Redders jumps in the driver's seat and frantically begins pumping the electric window button. Up and down. Up and down. Up and down. Satisfied, he pays for the car (in cash) and drives away, the window still going up and down, up and down.

The man is incapable of doing anything outside of sitting in a car. It's bizarre. Does he take training while sat in his car, barking instructions out the window? Did he miss Jamie's birth because he couldn't get his Austin Allegro up the hospital corridor? When he dies and is buried, will the grave be big enough to fit his car in?

It doesn't matter because, as we all know, 'Arry Redknapp will never die as long as the transfer window is in operation.

Daniel Levy playing a game of brinkmanship

Daniel Levy is a chairman that loves to do a deal, sometimes at the behest of what is actually best for the club he's supposed to be in charge of. Often waiting until the final hour and sometimes minute of the transfer window, you can guarantee he won't be getting much sleep tonight/tomorrow morning.

When Redknapp was in charge of Spurs and Levy was chairman last year, there were so many prospective deals going on at White Hart Lane that, for a brief time, they were the only football club that could be observed from space. With the more low-key and less-demanding AVB now at the helm expect slightly less activity, but Spurs are still in need of some key personnel so Levy will no doubt spend tonight doing what he does best: bashing buttons on a calculator and occasionally taking his glasses off and rubbing his temples.

It could be worse though Daniel, at least 'Arry's not there trying to convince you to bid £15m for professional nonsense Tal Ben Haim.

The post-window curveball

You know what it's like - you stay up until the window closes, or as Jim White would say, 'SLAMS SHUT!' and go to bed safe in the knowledge that your key midfielder is staying on for at least another few months. Phew! Thank God for that.

But what's this? You've woken up this morning to find that he's gone to QPR for a derisory fee! How did that happen!? Well 'Arry Redknapp had something to do with it presumably, but you don't mean that do you? You mean, 'How has he signed after the window has apparently closed?'

I don't know. In fact, no-one does. But what I do know is that, for some reason, despite the window shutting players can complete the paperwork afterwards and move while you're tucked up in bed in your football team pyjamas. It's sickening. It's wrong. It's the curse of football.

And I don't know about you, but I blame Jim White.