The Fiver

Making sense of all the exciting wheeling and dealing that hasn't happened Click here to have the Fiver sent to your inbox every weekday at 5pm, or if your usual copy has stopped arriving Barry Glendenning theguardian.com, Monday 2 February 2015 11.50 EST The sort of thing that isn’t happening this year. Photograph: Screen grab. DEADLINE DAY: SKY’S THE LIMIT Gary Cotterill at QPR. Amy Lewis at Swansea. Chris Hull at West Brom. Keith Downie at Newcastle. Mark Benstead at Sunderland. Nick Collins at Arsenal,possibly perched on a top of a step-ladder​. Fraser Dainton at Manchester City. Tim Thornton at Hull (why wasn’t Chris Hull at Hull?). Rob Dorsett at Leicester City. Ben Ransom at Stoke. James Cooper at Manchester United. Paul Gilmour at Tottenham Hotspur. Peter Stevenson at Burnley. Since before first light on Deadline Day, Sky’s ​dedicated army of sports news men and women have been deployed at various Premier League training grounds and empty stadia around the country, their ears unsullied by the unwanted intrusion of giant purple marital aids and other objects now that they’re kept apart from the unwashed and occasionally feral hordes. At the time of writing, the big news of the day had come from Roger Clarke, whose cameraman had captured exclusive footage of a bemused fox out enjoying its morning constitutional at an otherwise deserted Crystal Palace training ground. Handed the unenviable task of following that, Rob Dorsett had to make do with reporting pictures of the considerably less cute and vulpineStoke defender Robert Huth walking through a car park in Leicester on his way to complete a loan deal. Rides don’t get much more white-knuckle. Elsewhere, on a day they’ve ​almost solely devoted to reporting the movements of footballers from one club to the other, it was with breathless excitement that Sky revealed the Big News that Spurs striker Harry Kane had signed a new and improved contract to not go anywhere for the next five-and-a-half years. Back in the studio, Jamie Carragher and Gary Neville were among many, many ex-pros ​with the unenviable job of making sense of all the exciting wheeling and dealing that hadn’t happened. With yellow ties having long been de rigeur for anyone involved in reporting transfer news for Sky’s biannual celebration, the maverick Mancunian wore an open collar and no tie, although the custardy jaundiced hue of his pocket square demonstrated that, for all his apparent rebelliousness, he is at heart a company man. A vision in blue instead of the regulation yellow in which she traditionally appears alongside excitable Scot Jim White on the deadline day home straight, Natalie Sawyer was this morning paired with Rob Wotton in a move that could scarcely be more shocking unless it was Lionel Messi signing for Rotherham United as the makeweight in a cash-plus-player deal for Conor Newton. The pair enjoyed a relaxed on-screen chemistry as they asked the probing questions of Gary and Jamie and Curbs and Walshy and Kammy and Roundy and Charlie, pausing occasionally to show hilarious photos of office banter boys wearing yellow socks and one forlorn spaniel whose owner had dressed him in a yellow tie. Frivolous pet-related tomfoolery it may be, but with the population gripped by intrigue regarding the likely whereabouts of West Brom midfielder Graham Dorrans this time tomorrow, it is important to ease the tension with some light relief. LIVE ON BIG WEBSITE Various Big Paper staff will be lurking about behind Simon Burnton rolling fags and prodding him with $ex toys as he liveblogs transfer deadline day right to the bitter end. QUOTE OF THE DAY January 2013: “We are signing a player of potential. We always feel we develop players well. We have proved that many times. We hope the boy enjoys coming here” – Lord Ferg gives Wilfried Zaha the big welcome. February 2015: “Wilfried Zaha has rejoined Crystal Palace from Manchester United on a permanent basis with the England winger believed to have signed a five-and-a-half-year contract” – Oh. FIVER LETTERS “Re. Friday’s Fiver: I feel you’re doing yourself a disservice. You claim that no one is ever calm while reading the Fiver but I disagree. I’m often calm and relaxed while reading the Fiver. In fact, ‘relaxed’ is probably an understatement. Maybe ‘drowsy’, or ‘soporific’. Basically, if I’m still awake by ‘Still Want More?’, then it’s a mini victory” – Matt Dony. “I watched Diego Costa sitting in the stands in his civvies during the stalemate with Man City, and then I watched an old episode of QI. The football had slightly more humorous moments, but what struck me was the extraordinary similarity of ​Costa with laconic comic Rich Hall. Brothers from another mother? Question for your six readers – what other comedian / footballer twins are out there?” – John Boyd. “I wonder if Marten Allen’s letter (Friday’s Fiver) could be the start of a new series of ‘Mundane Encounters With Famous People’ section of The Fiver. I’ll continue the theme by recounting the tale of the time I was stood at the urinal next to Steve McManaman in The Merton Pub, Bootle, during his Liverpool FC heyday. We nodded to each other and left in silence” – Darren Hilton. • Send your letters to the.boss@theguardian.com. And if you’ve nothing better to do you can also tweet the Fiver. Today’s winner of our prizeless letter o’the day is: Darren Hilton. JOIN GUARDIAN SOULMATES Chances are that if you’re reading this tea-timely football email, you’re almost certainly single. But fear not – if you’d like to find companionship or love, sign up here to view profiles of the kind of erudite, sociable and friendly folk who would never normally dream of going out with you. And don’t forget, it’s not the rejection that kills you, it’s the hope. RECOMMENDED LISTENING/VIEWING BITS AND BOBS Mauro Icardi has said sorry for calling Inter fans Bad Words after he threw his shirt to them in the crowd and they threw it straight back at him. Shareholders in the Brazilian equivalent of Walkers crisps are looking forward to bumper dividends following the news that, according to Juan Mata, Manchester United have widened the door marked Do One and have shoved Anderson through it in Internacional’s direction. Yakubu’s big bones will be squeezed into a Reading shirt after the 32-year-old successfully spelled his name correctly on the bottom of one of their contracts. Merseyside police are concerned that Liverpool and Everton fans might be too tired and emotional to watch the 5.30pm kick-off between the two sides without punching each other and have asked for the match to start earlier. Fun and games in Equatorial Guinea dept: Tunisia are facing heavy punishment after chasing the referee in their Africa Cup of Nations quarter-final defeat down the tunnel and attempting to kick and punch him. “If Equatorial Guinea were better I would have said they deserved to win, except we were better and the referee was even better than us, so well done to the referee,” grumbled striker Ahmed Akaichi, taking defeat in good heart. If The Fiver was not as lazy as it is, it would work up the news that Jérôme Champagne has announced he has withdrawn his Fifa presidential candidacy after failing to secure the minimum five nominations required into some kind of ‘Champagne put on ice’ headline. But them’s the breaks. Following the firing of a bullet into the back of English Stu’s head at Nottingham Forest, the club’s chief executive Paul Faulkner has been allowed to spend more time with his daffodils as he has been placed on gardening leave after resigning. West Ham have vigorously denied any shenanigans over the fact Diafra Sakho was too knacked to play for Senegal in the Africa Cup of Nations, but not knacked enough to not score the winner against Bristol City in the FA Cup last weekend. STILL WANT MORE? Down with this sort of thing. Photograph: Matt Johnstone/Guardian Paul Campbell is the deadline day grinch: why the transfer window should be abolished. Sean Ingle’s no fan of it either. Fans of blogs that round up the weekend’s Premier League football action could do worse than clicking on this hyperlink.