Culture

Premier League players who didn’t get a move: The Uncertain XI

Published

1 year ago

September 3, 2024

Premier League players who didn’t get a move: The Uncertain XI

Although the Premier League’s summer transfer window has closed, many big-name players still have their futures unresolved.

Other transfer windows remain open, including in Turkey, whose clubs can do business until September 13, so moves could still happen. But with four months until the start of the January window in the major European leagues, The Athletic has picked a starting XI of players who currently find themselves out of favour at their top-flight side.

Though not all have been ostracised completely from first-team action, their futures look uncertain.

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GK: Odysseas Vlachodimos

Vlachodimos, who made just seven appearances in his sole season at Nottingham Forest before joining Newcastle United on July 1, was signed as a makeweight to assist both clubs in complying with profit and sustainability rules (PSR), with midfielder Elliot Anderson going the other way.

While Anderson, a highly-rated 21-year-old Newcastle academy graduate, has played in each of Forest’s opening three matches of the season, Vlachodimos is not expected to play an on-pitch role under Eddie Howe.

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The 30-year-old Greece international was free to leave on loan, but Newcastle failed to find a suitable deal before Friday’s deadline. As it stands, he ranks behind Nick Pope and Martin Dubravka and is yet to make a Newcastle matchday squad — though Vlachodimos could become Howe’s No 2 should Dubravka, who is looking for first-team football, find a move in January.

With Raheem Sterling securing a deadline-day season-long loan to Arsenal, Chilwell holds the unwanted tag as the face of Enzo Maresca’s Chelsea ‘Bomb squad’.

It’s only a year since Chilwell looked set to play an important role under Mauricio Pochettino, with the newly-appointed Argentinian handing him the vice-captaincy in pre-season. Now, Chilwell is firmly out of favour at Stamford Bridge and appears set to struggle on the fringes.

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Maresca prefers inverted full-backs, which does not fit with Chilwell’s overlapping game. Marc Cucurella is the Italian coach’s first choice at left-back, and he has also trialled Malo Gusto, a natural right-back, in that position in pre-season. Levi Colwill, who has started in central defence in each of Chelsea’s three opening matches of the league season, is another option at left-back, though his future appears to be set at the heart of the defence.

Chilwell, 27, is one of Chelsea’s highest earners, so it may be challenging to engineer a move away in January unless one of the elite sides in the Premier League or continental Europe are willing to take on his salary. Arsenal are paying less than 50 per cent of Sterling’s wages, so Chelsea may be willing to cut their losses for Chilwell to engineer a move away.

Tierney was expected to leave Arsenal this summer, having spent last season on loan at Real Sociedad in La Liga, but a hamstring injury suffered while playing for Scotland at the European Championship ruled him out of a move.

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The 27-year-old played an important role at the Emirates Stadium after leaving Celtic in summer 2019 but was a casualty of Mikel Arteta’s desire to elevate the team into title contenders when he was appointed at the end of that calendar year.

While he may not be a good fit under the Spaniard and may never play for Arsenal again with so much competition in his position, Tierney has the quality and experience to find himself another Premier League club in January — should he not suffer any setbacks on his return from injury.

Tierney assisted twice in 20 league appearances last season as Real Sociedad finished sixth in La Liga.

Tierney spent last season on loan at Real Sociedad (Aitor Alcalde/Getty Images)

Unlike team-mate Chilwell, Disasi is still around the first team under Maresca, but he is set to play a significantly reduced role this season.

Signed for £38.5million (€45m) last summer from Monaco of France’s Ligue 1, Disasi made an immediate impression, scoring on his debut in a 1-1 draw against Liverpool. His best performance of the season came against Manchester City in another 1-1 in February, where he made 16 clearances, the most by a Chelsea player in the league in eight seasons.

But after suffering an injury which sidelined him for the 6-0 defeat of Everton in April, Disasi struggled to get back into the side as Chelsea’s results improved. Disasi started just once in the final eight league matches, and that was the humiliating 6-0 defeat to London rivals Arsenal.

Despite him featuring regularly under previous manager Pochettino, Maresca does not favour the 26-year-old. Disasi did play in both legs of the Conference League qualifier against Swiss side Servette as Chelsea confirmed their place in the league phase with a 3-2 aggregate victory and made the matchday squad for the 1-1 draw with Crystal Palace on Sunday, but he is yet to register a minute in the league this season.

Kiwior proved a valuable and versatile squad player for Arsenal in 2023-24, filling in at left-back on 13 occasions in the league, including during a seven-match winning streak. On that run, Kiwior scored once and provided three assists.

However, due to Jurrien Timber’s return to fitness after missing the majority of last season with a cruciate ligament tear and the £42million signing of Riccardo Calafiori, Kiwior does not appear to have a role under Arteta. After missing out on the matchday squad in the opening-weekend 2-0 win over Wolves, Kiwior has been included in Arteta’s two most recent squads, but he is yet to get onto the pitch.

The 24-year-old is a Poland international and undoubtedly has the quality to start in the Premier League. If his situation does not change before January’s transfer window, he could push to move elsewhere for the second half of the season.

(Andrew Kearns – CameraSport via Getty Images)

Lamptey has been around at the Premier League level for a long time, so it is easy to forget he is still just 23.

He has a breakout season in 2022-23, but injuries and Brighton team-mate Joel Veltman’s consistency have meant Lamptey has struggled to re-establish himself as a starter.

A first appearance of the season came in last week’s Carabao Cup win over League One neighbours Crawley but he is yet to register his first minutes in the Premier League. There could now be a window for Lamptey to impress under new head coach Fabian Hurzeler, as Veltman went off with an injury in the 1-1 draw against Arsenal on the weekend.

Still, as it stands, he remains on the fringes of Brighton’s squad.

It has been a difficult few years for Guedes, who once looked set for a career at the top of the game.

Guedes has failed to establish himself in the starting XI at Wolves since moving from Spanish club Valencia in 2022-23 and has spent portions of the last two seasons on loan at Benfica in Portugal and back in La Liga with Villarreal. The 27-year-old was linked with a transfer all this summer, but after one failed to materialise, he finds himself on the fringes of Gary O’Neil’s starting XI.

He has yet to start in the league this season, but he impressed in the Carabao Cup last week, scoring twice as Wolves beat recently-relegated Championship side Burnley 2-0. Due to his impressive performance midweek, O’Neil gave him an opportunity in the league on the weekend from the bench, replacing the goalscorer Jean-Ricner Bellegarde in the 75th minute in a 1-1 draw away to Nottingham Forest.

Given Wolves’ long-term struggles in front of goal, O’Neil could be tempted to give Guedes another shot — even if he looked set to depart in this window.

After spending a season out on loan at Watford in the 2022-23 Championship, Choudhury broke back into the Leicester City side for their title-winning campaign in that division last season but now finds himself out of favour again at the King Power Stadium.

Choudhury was an unused substitute in Leicester’s opening two Premier League fixtures, then came off the bench to assist a goal in their 4-0 Carabao Cup win over Tranmere Rovers of League Two last Tuesday. However, Choudhury did not make the squad for the league game at home against Aston Villa on Saturday, where Leicester lost 2-1, and he appears firmly out of manager Steve Cooper’s plans.

While Eriksen continues to retain an important role for Denmark’s national team, he is now little more than a fringe player at Manchester United.

The now 32-year-old was an important part of the United side in his 2022-23 debut season, making 28 league appearances, but saw his role diminish in the following on as teenager Kobbie Mainoo emerged from the academy ranks to take his place in the team.

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Christian Eriksen has become the odd man out in United’s midfield

Despite fellow central midfielder Scott McTominay recently departing for Italy’s Napoli, Eriksen was an unused substitute in United’s first two league matches of the season and was only brought on with five minutes remaining in the 3-0 defeat to rivals Liverpool on Sunday.

Eriksen could still be a backup to Mainoo under Erik ten Hag, but it appears his days as a starter at the club are over.

Almiron, who had a significant impact for Newcastle in the 2022-23 season as they qualified for the Champions League, was linked with a move away from St James’ Park for much of the summer’s transfer window.

Earlier in the window, a move back to MLS with Charlotte FC fell through. Almiron knows the North American league well after spending three years at Atlanta United from 2016 to 2019, helping them win the title in his final season.

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As Friday’s deadline drew nearer, the now 30-year-old was involved in discussions for a swap deal involving Anthony Elanga, but Nottingham Forest declined Newcastle’s proposal. Almiron made his second league appearance of the season on Sunday, coming on as a 90th-minute substitute as they beat Tottenham Hotspur 2-1, but he does not appear close to Eddie Howe’s starting XI despite a lack of natural right-sided wingers in the squad.

(Paul Ellis ELLIS/AFP via Getty Images)

West Ham United made Ings available for transfer back at the beginning of the window, but he did not secure a move.

The former England international played five minutes off the bench in the 2-1 opening-weekend loss to Aston Villa, one of his former clubs, but was an unused substitute in the 2-0 win over Crystal Palace the following Saturday.

Ings was then left out of the matchday squad by new head coach Julen Lopetegui for both the 1-0 win against Bournemouth, his first pro club, in the Carabao Cup last Wednesday and on Saturday, as Manchester City beat them 3-1 in the league. Now aged 32, his future at the east London club remains uncertain.

(Top photos: Getty Images)

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Culture

Video: 250 Years of Jane Austen, in Objects

Published

2 weeks ago

December 18, 2025

Press Room

Video: 250 Years of Jane Austen, in Objects

new video loaded: 250 Years of Jane Austen, in Objects

To capture Jane Austen’s brief life and enormous impact, editors at The New York Times Book Review assembled a sampling of the wealth, wonder and weirdness she has brought to our lives.

By Jennifer Harlan, Sadie Stein, Claire Hogan, Laura Salaberry and Edward Vega

December 18, 2025

Culture

Try This Quiz and See How Much You Know About Jane Austen

Published

3 weeks ago

December 16, 2025

Press Room

Try This Quiz and See How Much You Know About Jane Austen

“Window seat with garden view / A perfect nook to read a book / I’m lost in my Jane Austen…” sings Kristin Chenoweth in “The Girl in 14G” — what could be more ideal? Well, perhaps showing off your literary knowledge and getting a perfect score on this week’s super-size Book Review Quiz Bowl honoring the life, work and global influence of Jane Austen, who turns 250 today. In the 12 questions below, tap or click your answers to the questions. And no matter how you do, scroll on to the end, where you’ll find links to free e-book versions of her novels — and more.

Culture

Revisiting Jane Austen’s Cultural Impact for Her 250th Birthday

Published

3 weeks ago

December 16, 2025

Press Room

Revisiting Jane Austen’s Cultural Impact for Her 250th Birthday

On Dec. 16, 1775, a girl was born in Steventon, England — the seventh of eight children — to a clergyman and his wife. She was an avid reader, never married and died in 1817, at the age of 41. But in just those few decades, Jane Austen changed the world.

Her novels have had an outsize influence in the centuries since her death. Not only are the books themselves beloved — as sharply observed portraits of British society, revolutionary narrative projects and deliciously satisfying romances — but the stories she created have so permeated culture that people around the world care deeply about Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy, even if they’ve never actually read “Pride and Prejudice.”

With her 250th birthday this year, the Austen Industrial Complex has kicked into high gear with festivals, parades, museum exhibits, concerts and all manner of merch, ranging from the classily apt to the flamboyantly absurd. The words “Jane mania” have been used; so has “exh-Aust-ion.”

How to capture this brief life, and the blazing impact that has spread across the globe in her wake? Without further ado: a mere sampling of the wealth, wonder and weirdness Austen has brought to our lives. After all, your semiquincentennial doesn’t come around every day.

By ‘A Lady’

Jane Austen’s House, Chawton, England

Austen published just four novels in her lifetime: “Sense and Sensibility” (1811), “Pride and Prejudice” (1813), “Mansfield Park” (1814) and “Emma” (1815). All of them were published anonymously, with the author credited simply as “A Lady.” (If you’re in New York, you can see this first edition for yourself at the Grolier Club through Feb. 14.)

Where the Magic Happened

Janice Chung for The New York Times

Placed near a window for light, this diminutive walnut table was, according to family lore, where the author did much of her writing. It is now in the possession of the Jane Austen Society.

An Iconic Accessory

Jane Austen’s House, Chawton, England

Few of Austen’s personal artifacts remain, contributing to the author’s mystique. One of them is this turquoise ring, which passed to her sister-in-law and then her niece after her death. In 2012, the ring was put up for auction and bought by the “American Idol” champion Kelly Clarkson. This caused quite a stir in England; British officials were loath to let such an important cultural artifact leave the country’s borders. Jane Austen’s House, the museum now based in the writer’s Hampshire home, launched a crowdfunding campaign to Bring the Ring Home and bought the piece from Clarkson. The real ring now lives at the museum; the singer has a replica.

Austen Onscreen

Since 1940, when Austen had a bit of a moment and Greer Garson and Laurence Olivier starred in MGM’s rather liberally reinterpreted “Pride and Prejudice,” there have been more than 20 international adaptations of Austen’s work made for film and TV (to say nothing of radio). From the sublime (Emma Thompson’s Oscar-winning “Sense and Sensibility”) to the ridiculous (the wholly gratuitous 2022 remake of “Persuasion”), the high waists, flickering firelight and double weddings continue to provide an endless stream of debate fodder — and work for a queen’s regiment of British stars.

Jane Goes X-Rated

Tony Cenicola/The New York Times

The rumors are true: XXX Austen is a thing. “Jane Austen Kama Sutra,” “Pride and Promiscuity: The Lost Sex Scenes of Jane Austen” and enough slash fic and amateur porn to fill Bath’s Assembly Rooms are just the start. Purists may never recover.

A Lady Unmasked

Jane Austen’s House, Chawton, England

Austen’s final two completed novels, “Northanger Abbey” and “Persuasion,” were published after her death. Her brother Henry, who oversaw their publication, took the opportunity to give his sister the recognition he felt she deserved, revealing the true identity of the “Lady” behind “Pride and Prejudice,” “Emma,” etc. in a biographical note. “The following pages are the production of a pen which has already contributed in no small degree to the entertainment of the public,” he wrote, extolling his sister’s imagination, good humor and love of dancing. Still, “no accumulation of fame would have induced her, had she lived, to affix her name to any productions of her pen.”

Wearable Tributes

Tony Cenicola/The New York Times

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a Jane Austen fan wants to find other Jane Austen fans, and what better way to advertise your membership in that all-inclusive club than with a bit of merch — from the subtle and classy to the gloriously obscene.

The Austen Literary Universe

Elizabeth Renstrom for The New York Times

On the page, there is no end to the adventures Austen and her characters have been on. There are Jane Austen mysteries, Jane Austen vampire series, Jane Austen fantasy adventures, Jane Austen Y.A. novels and, of course, Jane Austen romances, which transpose her plots to a remote Maine inn, a Greenwich Village penthouse and the Bay Area Indian American community, to name just a few. You can read about Austen-inspired zombie hunters, time-traveling hockey players, Long Island matchmakers and reality TV stars, or imagine further adventures for some of your favorite characters. (Even the obsequious Mr. Collins gets his day in the sun.)

A Botanical Homage

Created in 2017 to mark the 200th anniversary of Austen’s death, the “Jane Austen” rose is characterized by its intense orange color and light, sweet perfume. It is bushy, healthy and easy to grow.

Aunt Jane

Jane Austen’s House, Chawton, England

Hoping to cement his beloved aunt’s legacy, Austen’s nephew James Edward Austen-Leigh published this biography — a rather rosy portrait based on interviews with family members — five decades after her death. The book is notable not only as the source (biased though it may be) of many of the scant facts we know about her life, but also for the watercolor portrait by James Andrews that serves as its frontispiece. Based on a sketch by Cassandra, this depiction of Jane is softer and far more winsome than the original: Whether that is due to a lack of skill on her sister’s part or overly enthusiastic artistic license on Andrews’s, this is the version of Austen most familiar to people today.

Cultural Currency

Steve Parsons/Associated Press

In 2017, the Bank of England released a new 10-pound note featuring Andrews’s portrait of Austen, as well as a line from “Pride and Prejudice”: “I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading!” Austen is the third woman — other than the queen — to be featured on British currency, and the only one currently in circulation.

In the Trenches

During World War I and World War II, British soldiers were given copies of Austen’s works. In his 1924 story “The Janeites,” Rudyard Kipling invoked the grotesque contrasts — and the strange comfort — to be found in escaping to Austen’s well-ordered world amid the horrors of trench warfare. As one character observes, “There’s no one to touch Jane when you’re in a tight place.”

Baby Janes

Tony Cenicola/The New York Times

You’re never too young to learn to love Austen — or that one’s good opinion, once lost, may be lost forever.

The Austen Industrial Complex

Elizabeth Renstrom for The New York Times

Maybe you’ve not so much as seen a Jane Austen meme, let alone read one of her novels. No matter! Need a Jane Austen finger puppet? Lego? Magnetic poetry set? Lingerie? Nameplate necklace? Plush book pillow? License plate frame? Bath bomb? Socks? Dog sweater? Whiskey glass? Tarot deck? Of course you do! And you’re in luck: What a time to be alive.

Around the Globe

Goucher College Special Collections & Archives, Alberta H. and Henry G. Burke Collection; via The Morgan Library & Museum

Austen’s novels have been translated into more than 40 languages, including Polish, Finnish, Chinese and Farsi. There are active chapters of the Jane Austen Society, her 21st-century fan club, throughout the world.

Playable Persuasions

Tony Cenicola/The New York Times

In Austen’s era, no afternoon tea was complete without a rousing round of whist, a trick-taking card game played in two teams of two. But should you not be up on your Regency amusements, you can find plenty of contemporary puzzles and games with which to fill a few pleasant hours, whether you’re piecing together her most beloved characters or using your cunning and wiles to land your very own Mr. Darcy.

#SoJaneAusten

The wild power of the internet means that many Austen moments have taken on lives of their own, from Colin Firth’s sopping wet shirt and Matthew Macfadyen’s flexing hand to Mr. Collins’s ode to superlative spuds and Mr. Knightley’s dramatic floor flop. The memes are fun, yes, but they also speak to the universality of Austen’s writing: More than two centuries after her books were published, the characters and stories she created are as relatable as ever.

Bonnets Fit for a Bennett

Peter Flude for The New York Times

For this summer’s Grand Regency Costumed Promenade in Bath, England — as well as the myriad picnics, balls, house parties, dinners, luncheons, teas and fetes that marked the anniversary — seamstresses, milliners, mantua makers and costume warehouses did a brisk business, attiring the faithful in authentic Regency finery. And that’s a commitment: A bespoke, historically accurate bonnet can easily run to hundreds of dollars.

Most Ardently, Jane

The Morgan Library & Museum

Austen was prolific correspondent, believed to have written thousands of letters in her lifetime, many to her sister, Cassandra. But in an act that has frustrated biographers for centuries, upon Jane’s death, Cassandra protected her sister’s privacy — and reputation? — by burning almost all of them, leaving only about 160 intact, many heavily redacted. But what survives is filled with pithy one-liners. To wit: “I do not want people to be very agreeable, as it saves me the trouble of liking them a great deal.”

Stage and Sensibility

Austen’s works have been adapted numerous times for the stage. Some plays (and musicals) hew closely to the original text, while others — such as Emily Breeze’s comedic riff on “Pride and Prejudice,” “Are the Bennet Girls OK?”, which is running at New York City’s West End Theater through Dec. 21 — use creative license to explore ideas of gender, romance and rage through a contemporary lens.

Austen 101

Tony Cenicola/The New York Times

Austen remains a reliable fount of academic scholarship; recent conference papers have focused on the author’s enduring global reach, the work’s relationship to modern intersectionality, digital humanities and “Jane Austen on the Cheap.” And as one professor told our colleague Sarah Lyall of the Austen amateur scholarship hive, “Woe betide the academic who doesn’t take them seriously.”