Morning all. Transfer deadline day. One of the most unsavoury days in the footballing calendar and with the English deadline day finishing at 5pm this afternoon it feels like it’s going to be a busy one.

Not least because of what’s happened all summer. Transfers across the Premier League that are normally done without fuss have dragged out as teams like Leicester, or some of the European clubs, have all decided they all wanted ridiculous money for their players. £55million seems like a middle of the road Premier League player these days and quite frankly, that’s ridiculous.

You’ve got players like Tyrone Mings – who couldn’t make it at Bournemouth – having £20million dropped on him. The levels of inflation are farcical and that explains why not a ton of business has been done, but a bit will be done today I reckon as clubs get desperate.

How desperate will Everton get? They clearly want a wide forward and dropped a big old fee and players at Palace’s feet, only for them to reject, which I suspect triggered their interest in Iwobi. Personally I hope that Arsenal sent back the rejection with a smiley face emoji and a winky face emoji saying “not at that price, but keep talking” because I’d happily take £35million for him. He hasn’t really evolved, his end product was woeful last season and £35million in the bank would give us enough cash to maybe go back to RB Leipzig and ask them if they want to tango re: Upemencano.

They are supposedly pressing hard for Emile Smith-Rowe and given that Arsenal had already sent him that way in January, I’d hope that the relationship between the clubs is good. Imagine if he could go there for two seasons to hone his skills, then we could get a centre half ready to slot in now. It feels like it could work for all parties but I guess it’s easier said on an Arsenal fans blog than executing in real life.

Every club is always trying to get the upper hand. Every club wants a bargain of buying and a massive fee if selling. Every club likes to think they can steal a march and sometimes that leads to sometimes underhand tactics like tapping up players. Or, as many of us feel was the case on deadline day deals with Demba Ba years ago, some clubs like to play with teams before pulling out the rug from under them.

That’s why I’m not so keen on the David Luiz rumours. If it’s true that he wants out and Arsenal can have him for £8million then that deal needs to be done first thing this morning. Chelski are the kind of scummy club to drag it out until the last minute then reject just to stop us from signing somebody. As I mentioned above they have form in that regard with Demba Ba. It was Mourinho who was the manager then and whilst Frank Lampard has always come across as somebody who wouldn’t engage in the kind of snide tactics that his former boss would, he is after all his former boss, so who’s to say what kind of wankiness he still has up his sleeve?

Personally I’m not sure it improves us that much. Mustafi is the one we clearly want out but I see similarities in the two players.

Mustafi has a rick in his game and will always deliver brain farts. Ditto for Luiz.

Mustafi goes to ground early and commits early in the tackle. I’ve seen the same with Luiz in many an occasion.

Mustafi has a decent passing range when you look at the numbers. Again, ditto with Luiz, as we’ve all seen.

The difference is Luiz is 32 and has less resale value. If the deal is to be done at £8million then it makes sense. He’s a decent player, not a great player, but if the likes of Leipzig want £75million for Upemencano then he simply isn’t going to be in our price range. Not unless we set up the mother of all instalment plans. I’d be surprised to see the club do that again. Certainly this summer at least.

So what should Arsenal be doing? Or, rather, what do I want them to be doing?

Well, first and foremost I hope they set themselves some hourly targets. If they make a bid to Chelski then we have to give them until 11am at the latest to accept. Because if we haven’t heard from them by midday then Arsenal need to pursue other options. Rugani has been talked about, there’s been a link to the São Paulo centre half Robert Arboleda. That one would be a surprise given he’s halfway across the world and there’d only be a matter of hours to complete the transfer, but with Edu now in post you never quite know. He’s 27, an experienced player, but expecting a player like that to slot in and make an instant impact within the next week – and that’s what we need given that we’ll have Holding returning from injury within the next few weeks – is a bit of a stretch I think. It’s a gamble too far.

Which is why I guess Luiz then makes a little more sense, even if I don’t like it, because he’s Premier League ready, he’ll know Unai Emery from his time at PSG. They were a bit ‘ships in the night’ as Luiz left shortly after Emery joined but they’ll have had time to get to know each other. The fact that Luiz is supposedly willing to force through the move is an interesting one too. He’s at a Chelski team in the Champions League and he’d be joining a Europa League team. Admittedly they’re weaker with the loss of Hazard but it says something about the draw that he’s wanting to make this move, especially as he only signed a new deal at Chelski just over a year ago so it does seem a little strange he wants out now.

We’ll just have to see how today pans out. If we don’t get him I won’t be too stressed but if we do or course he gets my support.

It looks like the Tierney deal will be done too, which is further advanced, but I’ll wait until that ones confirmed before giving more thoughts, as I’ve kind of spent a bit of time on that already this summer and it’s dragged on long enough as it is!

And with that, I’ll leave you be, glued to your social media feeds in ‘refresh’ mode for the day.

Laters folks.