By Tim Stannard

Unfancied Barcelona stopper, Samuel Umtiti, spotted at Emirates to fuel rumors of winter transfer to Arsenal 

It's a joyous time to be alive. 

It's a brand new year - a chance to renew cherished vows with this thing called life, LaLiga is back, back, back and what's more, the winter transfer window is officially open. 

And that's why Sports Burst is delighted to bring y'all the big news that today, Thursday 2nd January, Watford have loaned defender Dimitri Foulquier to Granada. 

Starting off with a bang. 

However, the enormity of that move could be trounced should Samuel Umtiti swap Arsenal for Barcelona over the next few days. That appears to be an actual thing with the French stopper attending Wednesday's game between Arsenal and Manchester United, taking a look at David Luiz and thinking that "yep, I would love to play alongside him." Umtiti just has four league starts for Barca this season.

Barcelona are back in action on Saturday in a Catalan derby against a bottom-of-the-table Espanyol side, that opted to spend the festive period sacking their old manager and appointing a new one in the form of Abelardo. 

Meanwhile, Real Madrid are largely focussed on doing something with the players that they have already rather than getting rid of anyone or bringing new blood in. 

Getting Eden Hazard, Marco Asensio, and James Rodriguez fit would be a good start as well as finding some kind of use for the malfunctioning Luka Jovic and Gareth Bale with Madrid having scored just the single goal over the past three LaLiga matches. 

A chance to turn that form around comes on Saturday with Madrid enjoying a mini city derby against a feisty Getafe side. 

Tune into the live Sports Burst show at 12PM ET on our beIN SPORTS Facebook page which will try and forecast the future for both these teams and everyone else in the multiverse.

Zlatan starts farewell tour at Milan as agent slams Manchester United

At the same time as Zlatan Ibrahimovic arrived at Milan on Thursday for a medical ahead of an initial six-month spell in San Siro - "he'll stimulate the whole team" declared Milan boss, Stefano Pioli - the Swede's demure agent, Mino Raiola issued a New Year's message of joy. 

Starting with the 38-year-old's move to Milan, Raiola declared that "these six months will be the last tour of Queen, a long tribute." Someone is perhaps not up to speed with the manner of the very tragic passing of Freddie Mercury and also may not want to be comparing Serie A to a place where players who are even too old for MLS go out to pasture. 

With a microphone still in front of his nose, Raiola was not done with Zlatan and moved on to the topic of his other major client, Paul Pogba, who has suffered a recurrence of an ankle injury and is back on the sidelines again for up to a month. "I wouldn't bring anyone to (Manchester United). They'd also ruin Maradona, Pele and Maldini."

Happy New Year, Mino!

Liverpool to turn screw at top of EPL table 

Manchester United saw in 2020 on Wednesday as the team generally performed in 2019 in the Premier League - by losing. 

To this end, the English media has linked the club with a move for RB Leipzig and Germany striker Timo Werner. Good luck with that one. 

The defeat to Arsenal was the penultimate match in the Premier League Survivor marathon of matches. The last is Liverpool taking on Sheffield United today and pretty much skipping through daisies ahead of the game with the league leaders ahead of Leicester City by ten points and with two matches in hand. 

Thursday's encounter will not see the first minutes of the team's new signing, Takumi Minamino, who has joined from Red Bull Salzburg, however the player could make his debut against Everton in the FA Cup this weekend.