Brennan Johnson and Dwight McNeil are on the move — not to new leagues or foreign markets, but to each other's clubs in a direct player swap between two Premier League sides. The deal is a rare arrangement in English football, though it is not entirely without precedent.

Player exchanges — where clubs trade footballers rather than cash — have occurred at various points throughout the history of the Premier League, with mixed results on both sides. The practice is uncommon largely because valuations are difficult to agree on and because most clubs prefer the financial flexibility that a straightforward transfer provides.

When two clubs do agree to swap players, both sides are effectively betting that their incoming signing will outperform the one they are sending in the opposite direction. That gamble has paid off for some clubs and backfired spectacularly for others.

Johnson and McNeil are the latest footballers to find themselves at the centre of this kind of arrangement, which remains one of the more unusual mechanisms in the modern transfer market.