Maghnes Akliouche and his excellent hair look like they are ready to shift from Monaco to the tax-heavy locale of Paris Saint-Germain. We’ve discussed him a lot over the past two summers, and if PSG were looking for cover on a Bradley Barcola transfer (likely to Liverpool?), Akliouche would be it.

Randal Kolo Muani is returning to Juventus on a “loan with an obligation to buy” of €45M reports Florian Plettenberg (and others). This is about as dumb and as expensive as it gets these days, and leaves me with a sense that Juventus will never quite get on the modern recruitment train.

Lewis Hall is rumoured to be a sensible target for Manchester United. We thought Hall was a great acquisition from Newcastle two summers ago, and if he can stay healthy, would also be a good piece of business from United at any sensible price. That said, United rarely do “sensible prices” so we’ll see where this one ends up.

Eddie Howe has left the Newcastle building per se, not least due to the fact that Newcastle management were set on selling Bruno Guimares to Arsenal. That deal looks locked in now in the region of £70Mish, which is hefty, but Arsenal also have needs and the Magpies are sensibly cashing in on this one. [Note: The boys on the podcast covered why Howe had to leave earlier this week.]

Romano reports that Hull City - who I needed reminding are a now Premier League team - have signed Nobel Mendy from Rayo Vallecano. Hull’s recruitment has been weird for years, so we’re excited to see what they do at the PL level, but Mendy at least looks like a highly defensive centre back, so they’ve got that going for them.

In a classic footballer tax move to Italy (not a joke), John Stones has signed a two-year contract at Inter Milan.

Gonzalo Garcia is on his way from Real Madrid to… Fulham? Garcia is a promising young striker who got decent minutes with the first team last year, but hasn’t done the usual loan path you would see for a 22-year old. The big concern on our end is the consistently low shot volume across his entire playing sample. We have learned from many examples that 1.7 shots per game does not a productive Premier League forward make. But we’ll see!

Meanwhile, Madrid are moving for Carlos Espi, who looks like an outstanding young pure striker at Levante. His profile has “Future Superstar” written all over it, though there are issues with his passing.

In a similar vein to the James Trafford deal mentioned above, Chelsea paid the buyout on Liam Delap last summer, partly as a football move (one that failed), but more with an eye to selling him again this summer if he didn’t work out. Everton, Leeds, and Forest are the latest teams rumoured to have interest, but it’s hard to tell how much is legit versus agent and Chelsea-lead sales so far.