Only a few days remaining now of the January transfer window and things have started to liven up a little. The early part of these windows is so quiet that they may as well have a transfer day instead and relieve the fans of the panic they endure during the 31 day period.

Unsurprisingly, Jermaine Beckford is in the papers once more. This time it’s the Mirror and they’re linking him with an immediate move to Everton for £2m. It’s claimed that Becks has already signed a pre-contract with Everton, but apparently, they mean very little and with other clubs now sniffing around and trying to capture his signature they may be wanting to close the deal sooner.

On a more positive note, Leeds have finally secured their first signing of the window bringing in Max Gradel permanently from Leicester. Max has signed a two and a half year deal at Elland Road after handing in a transfer request to Leicester on Friday.

No fee is mentioned in the Sky Sports report, so you can safely assume Bates has stuck with the norm of not revealing them and Max is our latest ‘undisclosed fee’. I’d hazard a guess that we haven’t paid much more than £250,000 though so this presents great value for money for Leeds.

Gradel is clearly delighted at securing the move telling Sky Sports that;

“I’m just happy to move on. It’s a very, very big club and has massive fans. I’m very happy,

“I’m happy to be part of this club as they are very ambitious. I’m going to show my proper football now, I’m very happy.”

And we’re more than happy to have you Max. The ‘massive fans’ he refers to must have been the slightly overweight pair who were sitting in front of me at White Hart Lane the other day. They’d clearly been enjoying the Chicken Balti pies at Elland Road.

Max goes on to reveal that Nigel Pearson didn’t want him to leave Leicester, but the youngster knew first team football was the best option for his career and couldn’t stand the thought of returning to the reserves.