[goldenHuddlestone]

Where would we be without all the rumours doing the rounds during the summer? And how much of it actually comes to fruition?

So Thierry Henry was seen at Liverpool's training ground at Melwood? He was also seen looking at properties in the Merseyside area and a bookie managed to further substantiate an already shaky rumour by dropping the price of Henry being a Red to 3/1.

Well, as things developed, Thierry has no intention of plying his trade at Anfield and for all we know it was never even under consideration by France’s footballing god. So does this prove that idle rumour-mongering and the blossoming of the ‘silly season’ has grown to almost astronomical proportions?

The whole world likes a bit of gossip and in the footballing fraternity, we are no different. Especially when we are trying to get our football fix during a summer without a major European international tournament, which is for most of us the very worst kind of summer.

As we mull over what our team did wrong and (in the case of perhaps nine or ten of the 92 league clubs) what they did right, we are always drawn to what lies around the corner and what can bring us that bit closer to the second week of August.

Publication of the fixture lists is a good place to start. Plans can be made, trips and outings savoured, and emotions predicted. Pre-season friendlies have, for me, always been pretty pointless affairs (literally) but at least they constitute an actual football match. It would have been at least six weeks since the last one and, look, they have a new kit as well. I must get one of those!

The weeks leading up to the kick-off itself are, therefore, the breeding ground for an infestation, much like a swarm of insects. The damage caused, not by the ruining of crops, but by the unfulfilled dream of a player you wished would join your club but has in fact turned you down. Or perhaps the whole thing turned out to be an unmitigated lie. Yet we all read these stories. We all fuel the machine.

Of all the big moves planned this summer, at least three or four clubs will have lost out where one will be successful. Fernando Torres may not end up at Anfield, guys. Get ready for that eventuality. Darren Bent may cost too much for Spurs. And, get used to it Chelsea fans, Andriy Shevchenko may want to stay after all.

It's all part of the merry-go-round that is the summer transfer window - only this window is thrown open even wider due to the endless supply of rumour/counter-rumour/speculation/second-guessing in the the ever-expanding medium of the Internet.

It is indeed dangerous to believe everything you hear, even if Mick in Liverpool has convinced you that his cousin works as an estate agent on the Wirral. Please do not let him convince you that he was showing the Henry family around a Georgian mansion. You may want it to be true, but think twice.

The stuff of fantasy should stay firmly where it belongs, either in our overactive imagination or in a fantasy football league.

[tiswas]

I blame the agents...they're the worst kind of rumour makers. They want the best deal for themselves first......er......sorry want the best deal for their client first, so makeup this wonder story that clubs had better hurry up & sign their client because he will not re sign for Darlington & claims Barcelona are waiting in the wings if the proposed transfer to Port Vale falls through