It is a strategy as old as it is effective. No longer have use for a first-team player and want to see him leave? Instruct them to train with the under-23s and let the nature of football take its course. The problem, more often than not, will soon resolve itself with a separation.

This common practice has been seen across the Premier League and English Football League again this summer. Dozens of faces that no longer fit have been marginalised and demoted to train at a level that ought to be beneath them or, in some cases, all alone.

The final weeks and days of a transfer window are where the practice becomes increasingly prevalent, too. These are the final opportunities to shift players and their wages from a club’s books. The next chance will not come again for months.

Some players will choose to sit tight and stubbornly leave only on their terms. Others will accept the inevitability of their plight and move on. Such is the bleakness of life in the “bomb squad”.

This transfer window ought to have been different. This is the first summer since FIFA clarified its regulations on the “status and transfer of players” (RSTP) in November. New commentaries of Article 14 (2) found that forcing a player to train on their own may result in a club engaging in “abusive conduct”. Footballers, the rules argue, do not warrant such degradation.

There will be readers who roll their eyes at that. How can a player, often well-remunerated, command sympathy when all they are being asked to...

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