With the transfer window closing, some moves that looked likely to happen all summer eventually failed to materialise. While Frenkie de Jong‘s long and public courtship by Manchester United was the most high-profile, there were other well-known names who also somewhat surprisingly stayed put.
There are a variety of reasons why players might not move on: the protagonists themselves might choose to stay and try to kick-start a faltering career; there are also those that may have outgrown their current clubs, but whose profile and contribution are too integral to be allowed to leave; and on occasion a collapsed deal might compromise the career of a player in the short term. Here we look at a selection of players that, for one reason or another, may have prospered from switching clubs during the summer.
