TransfersThe High Road Herald

Club Linked With Midfielder Solely Because A Journalist Saw Him Play Once

Barry Napier · Transfer Correspondent28 September

The link has now been aggregated eleven times without anyone adding a fact to it.

Tottenham have been linked with a midfielder on the basis that a journalist watched him play on a Tuesday evening in 2023 and thought he was quite good.

The link has since been aggregated eleven times across four countries, gaining in each retelling a degree of certainty it did not originally possess, and at no point acquiring a source.

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It is understood the club are monitoring the situation closely.

Nobody at the club is monitoring the situation. The situation does not exist. The journalist in question has confirmed to colleagues that he mentioned the player's name "in passing, basically as a nice thought".

The player's agent has been contacted for comment and has, in the manner traditional to the genre, neither confirmed nor denied, thereby producing a twelfth article.

A fee of £34 million has been widely reported. The figure's origin is unknown and appears to have been arrived at by somebody rounding up a different figure that was also made up.

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Injury LatestThe High Road Herald

Season Ticket Holder Develops Elaborate Theory Involving The Fixture Computer

Clive Ottaway · Injury Correspondent27 September

The theory has survived contact with a spreadsheet and two of his friends have quietly begun to believe it.

A North London man has spent the week assembling a theory of such internal consistency that two of his friends have quietly begun to believe it.

The theory, which concerns the scheduling of away fixtures immediately following international breaks, has reportedly survived contact with a spreadsheet and one fairly hostile conversation in a pub.

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It's not a conspiracy. It's a pattern. There's a difference.

Asked to explain the difference, the man produced a second document.

The Herald can confirm the spreadsheet contains eleven seasons of data, a column headed "SUSPICIOUS?" and conditional formatting. Three cells are red. He is unable to say what the red indicates, only that it is "obvious when you look at the whole thing".

At time of writing he had moved on to a second theory concerning the kit manufacturer, which this newspaper has elected not to publish.

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