Just been chatting with my mate at work about transfer windows and whether or not they are a good thing for football and also for our enjoyment of the game. (yes we are suposed to be working but given that I am working on a Budgetary Control review of the Council and he is working on a Financial Statements review I think it is safe to say talking footie is preferable!).

So what do you reckon - do you prefer things as they are now with the two designated windows or do you like it the way it used to be when players could be signed at any point in the season?

Purely from a football interest/enjoyment level I preferred it when players could move at any time. Sometimes when things went a little stale a big move could be just the tonic (and I don't mean purely at the club you support, I just mean for football full stop) as it created discussion points and something to banter about. It also meant that the papers had less scope for constant gossip/lies about who was going to be moving where in 8 months time as they had more of a focus on the current goings on.

I guess in terms of football it has brought a degree of stability to individual seasons and it prevents the richer clubs being able to constantly top up their squads as and when an injury comes along (something that poorer clubs would not be able to do) but I also think it prevents smaller clubs being able to operate on a tight squad as they are more fearful of picking up long term injuries. Having siad that it probably encourages clubs to bring through youngsters in these situations rather than bringing a player on a short term deal.

Anyhow, what are your thoughts?

I can understand the reasoning behind transfer windows but don't agree with them at all. The mentality behind it smacks of bureaucracy, rules for the sake of having rules rather than any well thought out planning. The thing with football is that the unexpected happens. You can only plan so far ahead. Whether it be injuries, loss of form, change of manager, player unrest - there is obviously no way that these, or any other variables you care to mention, can be confined to a couple of weeks a couple of times each season.

Other reasons include the end of transfer window rush, panic buying that can't do any long term good. Smaller teams, selling clubs that depend on transfers to survive, can't guarantee that a bigger club will want to come in for their star players during one of the tranfer windows. You could end up with a situation where the bigger clubs buy as many players as they can to cover every possible eventuality. Which would lead to oversized squads, accusations of hoarding players, problems with morale and so on.

There you go. Just a few reasons why I think transfer reasons should be scrapped. Someone else can put the case for keeping them.

don't agree with transfer windows either, I think it adds to the price of a player, makes for panic buyer at the end of the window, and then all this nonsense about players being cuptied after the January window.

I thought the idea was to stop clubs unsettling other clubs' players, however, since the gutter press/media have taken it upon themselves to take on this task, I reckon the transfer window system is a waste of time.

(Must be something to do with the word Windows if they called it iTtransfers I'm sure it would be neat/clean and easy-to-understand.)