April is usually the period where European clubs will finalise their transfer targets, make last trips to erase any doubts and carry out checks on behaviour and character. For the best-run clubs, deals can be all but completed in principle, even if the signing may ultimately depend on how a team finishes the existing campaign. This year, however, everything has changed.



Indeed, FIFA is examining ways to reconfigure the dates and length of the conventional summer transfer window in a manner that would allow seasons to be finished and a period of player trading to take place. The issue is particularly grave as more than 500 players in Europe’s top five leagues have contracts or loan spells that expire on June 30.



As such, budgets are up in the air and targets are changing. Clandestine suited-up meetings in hotel bars have been swapped for Zoom calls as agents and recruitment figures, according to one source, “wear a shirt and tie for the camera, with pyjama...