Transfer deadline day 2014: Done deals

If Villa and Cleverley end up getting along just fine, they can complete a permanent transfer in January for £7.5m. United seemingly prefers for that clause to be exercised, though Cleverley can certainly run down his contract and try to sign for a richer club for free in the summer if he’s a resounding success at Aston Villa.

Falcao is not going to the Red Devils on the cheap. Reports have Manchester United paying Monaco a £6 million loan fee and massive wages that will take the club’s one-year outlay for the striker over £24 million. If Manchester United want to buy him outright, it will likely cost them £55 million.

The deal dragged on and on, with it reportedly agreed to early in the day, but it wasn’t finalized until after the transfer deadline. Manchester United had to ask for an extension, which the Premier League granted, but then they pushed right up against the deadline of the extension and didn’t complete the deal until after midnight in the UK.

With Olivier Giroud set to miss several months after undergoing surgery on his leg, Arsene Wenger was in the market for another striker to help bolster his roster. Whether or not Welbeck can fill Giroud’s shoes remains to be seen, but he should work better playing as a center forward than Alexis Sanchez, who is more of a winger.

Ben Arfa caps a busy day by Hull, who also signed Abel Hernandez and Gaston Ramirez. It was a good summer for the Tigers, who now look like a safe bet to stay up and compete mid-table. Ben Arfa can give them a healthy dose of creativity, which was probably their biggest weakness, and they got it without paying a fee.

By the time Ben Arfa’s loan ends, he will be out of contract and free to sign wherever he wants, but now he will get to do so after playing in the previous year. That didn’t appear to be the case previously so he has made out well, as have Hull. Newcastle will be out from his wages this year, but they are still the clear losers here, having let a problem between the player and manager get to the point it did where it clearly hurt them.

Mané has been at Salzburg for the last couple of years, having moved to Austria from French club Metz in 2012. Since arriving, he has established himself as one of the team’s most important goalscorers, and has made a name for himself as a prolific scorer from midfield.

This is the fourth time that Kranjcar will play for Redknapp. First, he and Redknapp were at Portsmouth, then at Tottenham Hotspur, then at QPR. Kranjcar left the London club at the end of last season and looked set to rejoin Dynamo, but now he is back and he reportedly took a massive pay cut to do it.

Kranjcar’s last stint with QPR didn’t go very well. He was criticized for being overweight, he was injured at times and his play dipped, but he already looks like he is in much better shape. The 30-year-old missed the World Cup this summer through injury, but QPR insist that he has rehabbed very hard to get healthy again and with it has come a more fit player than he has been in years.

Last season, after joining Atléti from Ajax, Alderweireld didn’t get much playing time. He probably expected to get plenty of minutes with Atléti not having many senior defenders on their squad, but starters Miranda and Diego Godin were impeccable all season long. With the same pair set to be first choice yet again, Alderweireld became expendable, and Southampton are now the beneficiaries.

Doyle was an excellent player in his prime, but he hasn’t played at a high level for a very long time. He put together four very good seasons with Reading and was also effective in his first season at Wolves, but he’s struggled since the spring of 2010 at Premier League, Championship and even League One level.

Amalfitano’s exit from Marseille has been inevitable for a while, with the attacker having fallen out with the French club’s new manager Marcelo Bielsa. Amalfitano wasn’t in the coach’s plans for the new season, though showed up to training despite being asked to stay away. That eventually resulted in the session being canceled, and Amalfitano being entirely excluded.

So his departure wasn’t a case of if, but when. As it has turned out, he’s had to wait until deadline day to sign and seal his departure, with Sam Allardyce’s West Ham bolstering their attack with the versatile forward.

A a result, City have looked to cash in on the 29-year-old striker. Valencia have signed him on an initial loan deal, though as part of the switch they’re reportedly obligated to spend £24 million on making the transfer permanent next summer. It’s a great fee for the Citizens to recoup, considering his mediocre season with City.

Olympique Marseille have confirmed that they have completed the signing of Botafogo’s 19-year-old center back, Doria, for a fee believed to be €10m.

The highly-rated teenager had been linked with a variety of clubs this summer as Botafogo struggled to pay some of their players in the midst of financial turmoil.

It’s currently unclear whether there is a loan fee or how much of Ramirez’s wages Hull will be covering.

McArthur was a bit of a fringe player in his first year with Wigan, but he’s established himself firmly as first choice since then. He was a very good player for Wigan in the Premier League, then one of the absolute best players in the Championship last season. Understandably, McArthur opted to make a move to the Premier League once the opportunity presented itself.

While this is a quality signing for Palace, it also comes in the area where they arguably have the most quality. With Mile Jedinak and Joe Ledley in the team, defensive midfielders are the least of the team’s problems.

The Moroccan midfielder was signed from the Dutch club two years ago and made 51 appearances for Villa, but has now moved back to the club he joined from in 2012.

El-Ahmadi has 20 caps for Morocco, but was born and raised in the Netherlands where he played for Feyenoord and FC Twente.

Sandro went to Spurs from Internacional and immediately established himself as a quality defensive midfielder. Big and strong with great range for a player his size, Sandro was a pure destroyer and one of the best in the league. He was also surprisingly tidy on the ball, not a playmaker by any means, but capable of keeping possession for Redknapp’s Spurs teams.

But Sandro’s time at Spurs was done in by injuries. He injured his knee in January 2013 and missed the remainder of that season. He also had several knocks last season, and was set back by Tim Sherwood’s hate of all defensive midfielders. While there was some hope he may earn a place in the team under Mauricio Pochettino, the new manager favored Etienne Capoue, and then the team signed Benjamin Stambouli. That sealed Sandro’s exit, and Redknapp was happy to pounce.

Richards was once an automatic first-choice player for City and thought of as the best young defender in England before his career was stalled by a variety of injury problems. He’s been unable to stay fit over the last two seasons, playing just 18 games in that time frame.

But Fiorentina are banking on Richards getting fit, and if he does, he should be an excellent bargain signing. He was one of the fastest players in the Premier League before his injury issues, so even if he’s lost a step, he won’t be slow. He was also equally adept at playing central defense and right back at his best, so he could play two positions in both back-three and back-four systems, something that will be useful for the Viola.

The Miyaichi loan is no surprise at all. He’s struggled on quite a few different loan spells since joining Arsenal and has never looked good enough to play for the first team. Twente is a better move than most expected him to get. The Miquel sale, however, is a slightly different story.

Arsenal don’t currently have any central defense depth. Even if they had held on to Miquel to play U-21 football and be a backup this season, they would have been extremely thin at the back. With Miquel leaving and no one rumored to be coming in, the Gunners have just two defenders. Under normal circumstances, a Miquel sale would make sense, but Arsenal really have no defenders. Their backup central defenders are fullbacks.

PSV Eindhoven have completed the signing of Monaco’s young French center back Nicolas Isimat-Mirin on loan. The 22-year-old, who has appeared for France’s U-21 team, is a very highly-rated young player, though he’s yet to fully establish himself in Les Rouges et Blancs’ first team ahead of veteran center backs like Ricardo Carvalho and Andrea Raggi .

He’ll no doubt be hoping to get more of an experience of first-team football in the Eredivisie this season.

Manchester United have wrapped up their long-expected deal for Daley Blind. The Red Devils confirmed they had agreed to a deal with Ajax for Blind on Saturday, but they still had to finalize personal terms and the player had to pass a medical. Now that has been done and the Dutchman is officially a Manchester United player.

Blind played for Louis van Gaal at the World Cup, where he bounced between center back, wingback and midfield to great effect. His versatility was key to the Dutch’s run to the semifinals and it was clear why van Gaal was so keen on the 24-year-old. Not long after the tournament, the rumors started that van Gaal would try to sign Blind at Manchester United and now he has done it.

Coates was signed to serious acclaim back in 2011, but he’s failed to meet expectations at Anfield. Between the fairly low standard of football he came from and injury issues, he’s never quite achieved the level that he was projected to in the Premier League. At the end of last season, he was loaned to Nacional in his native Uruguay to regain fitness, and a loan deal or sale was always expected this summer.

When fully fit, Coates has been a good player for Uruguay, even if he’s never quite put it together for Liverpool. There’s a chance he never becomes a great Premier League player, but it’s equally likely that Sunderland have pulled off a total steal.

It wasn’t that long ago that Hernández was considered one of the best young strikers on the planet. Unfortunately, injury troubles badly stalled his development, and in the five seasons in which he featured in Serie A for Palermo, he scored just 17 league goals.

However, he appeared more regularly for the rosanero in the Italian second tier last season, scoring 14 goals in 28 league games. It was a campaign that offered hope that Hernández could yet deliver on his promise. Perhaps a fresh start in a new league is exactly what he needs in order to do so.

Chicharito was hailed as Mexico’s next young star from a young age and showed why with Chivas, where he scored 21 goals in a season at just 21 years old. That earned him a move to Manchester United, where he got off to a blazing start. The striker scored 20 goals in his first season at Old Trafford and while he slumped some to just 12 the next year, he bounced back with an 18-goal campaign in 2012-13.

But Chicharito was miserable last season. He notched just nine goals and struggled for playing time. By the time the World Cup came around, he wasn’t even first choice for Mexico anymore, and van Gaal has found little use for him since taking over as United manager. It was clear that the Mexican had to get a move away from Old Trafford and he’s done just that.