Matt Maher: January transfer window is gently pushed closed

So proclaimed the Premier League’s official X account yesterday morning, promoting a video detailing six of the “most pivotal” January deadline signings in history.

Top of the list was Fernando Torres’ then £50million English transfer record move from Liverpool to Chelsea in 2011.

Though this piece is being written a few hours before the window closes, it feels safe to say there will not be a deal anywhere near so earth-shattering or expensive this time around.

Instead, yesterday morning it seemed the biggest transfer wouldn’t even involve football, with Lewis Hamilton’s switch from Mercedes to Ferrari guaranteed to grab a fair portion of today’s back-page headlines.

For supporters of most Premier League clubs, the only thing deadline day would deliver was a shrug of the shoulders. It’s been that kind of month.

One question still to be answered was whether the collective spending of top-flight clubs would pass £100million?

While still a mind-boggling figure, it is a long way short of the £815m splashed out last January, including an outlay of £235m on deadline day alone.

Though something of a stretch to describe this window as the point the Premier League finally sobered up on spending, you might describe the past month as being more akin to a quiet evening in with a nice bottle of red, compared to the all-night session spent drinking from the top shelf of previous windows. That’s provided, of course, you exclude Nottingham Forest from the analogy.