WhatsApp, phantom medicals and agent 'Hail Marys' – What happens on transfer deadline day

The agent chuckles when asked whether his phone will be busy on deadline day. “I honestly don’t know what the football industry did before Whatsapp,” he says.“Every morning in January you’ll wake up to five or six messages that were sent after midnight. I think everyone in football is sending those messages late at night or first thing in the morning through the whole month.“It’s like the industry is living on Red Bull or espressos, just teeing up deals that largely don’t happen but they’re doing the work on just in case.“Then on deadline day all hell breaks loose. The phone just lights up all day. Maybe ten or 15 years ago it was just the manager or the Chairman taking the lead on the deal, but nowadays there’s a team of analysts, the loan manager, the data scientist – they will all want to know some information about a player.More from Football“An incredible amount of work goes into just about every transfer. Which makes it a bit crazy to think that so much can happen in a few hours on the final day.”Deadline day is football’s 24 hours of soap opera. “Footballers do enjoy it, watching it all play…
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