Chelsea’s move for Ross Barkley was concluded extremely quickly, with the midfielder signing last weekend after business was conducted swiftly after the opening of the window.
That was in stark contrast to the summer, where even deals that looked locked in from early – like the move for Tiemoue Bakayoko – took an age to complete.
That left the squad short on deadline day when moves for Barkley and Fernando Llorente fell through.
This time round has been the opposite, and one can imagine there’s a chance that the higher-ups, perhaps even Roman Abramovich himself had prodded Marina or whoever else is filling in for the departed Michael Emenalo, to get things done quickly and not stretch deals out for the sake of a few million pounds.
Perhaps having one fewer levels of hierarchy in the system allowed this deal to move through the gears more quickly. We’ll find out over the next few weeks.
