TRon

If he's staying in the PL then a club like Liverpool or maybe City would be the next logical step for glamour/money. But I would imagine most players outside of England would dream of playing for Madrid or Barcelona.

I don't really blame fans for getting antsy, from their POV it all looks like it's drifting and no one is at the helm. I'm a bit disappointed at the local journalists who feed into this though, although Geordie Journos podcast might be a bit of a stretch, even if one of them was bemoaning the fact other twitter commentators don't have his hard earned journalist credentials. PIF are slow for sure. But if it's slow and steady it's still better than on the cheap like we had with Ashley and Charnley. We are trying to hire best in class. I think with the pace of the build being slow, due in no small terms to PSR, we are going to lose players who have a short career span. This is something we will have to accept unfortunately unless something changes with the City case re APT sponsorships. Frustrating but I'd rather have owners who can at least pump money into the club if needed than owners who will saddle the club with debt and look to cream off the dividends.

He did want Newcastle anyway. I like him just for that.

Even if Isak stays, it will be his last season here. The club will take a pragmatic view and use him as the asset he is, and I would think he'd be professional enough to do his job while he's here, that's what really matters. In the meantime we can can prepare the ground to replace him with a striker of sufficient quality who wants to be here, and we can make sure Liverpool pay the right fee if they want him. We can do all this in the next month if everything drops right, but at this moment it looks unlikely. Partly because of clubs like Liverpool buying up our long term replacements so they have only themselves to blame.

You have my vote, but Eddie's the one needs convincing.

We aren't interested according to some north east journos, and he's not available for a daft price like £25m either. It would be double that.

His celebration might be a bit muted but there'd be nowt meek about it, neither would he acknowledge their fans. It's part of the cunt persona, he wouldn't really give that much of a fuck.

That's what I'm talking about, some recognisable names on there. Iv'e been critical myself with how they have let things drift with the Eales illness situation, but even so it does seem like we are still trying to recruit best in class when it comes to CEO, DOF or other positions. We might not be doing it very efficiently, but the intent is there.

The whole ground would be jumping if he smacked one in against Liverpool. Not that I think it will happen, but there's always a way back if a player wants it.

I wonder who the CEO does report to though? It's easy to say owners, but even the owners will have delegates for that. I don't imagine A- Rumayan or Reuben sit in on these meetings and make decisions.

They shouldn't have blown their wad on Ekitike then.

No one's ok with it. We just don't believe in rewarding either him or Liverpool by binning him off on the cheap.

Agree. But we want our money which is due, and that isn't £120m. Pay up or fuck off Liverpool.

Absolutely. There's a reason Liverpool are trying to sign him, he's one of the few strikers in the world who has made a mug of their superstar gold standard CB Van Dyke. He destroys the best defenders.

I thought it was maybe all being done on the sly but Liverpool could have plausible deniablility by saying it's just press speculation. But Graham Bailey did reckon that Howe has very good relations with Hughes from Liverpool and they will have discussed it, so who knows? It's possible.

That's some pretty serious underrating of Isak's finishing ability like. He might have other weaknesses but he's pretty deadly in front of goal. That's why replacing him is not going to be easy if we do sell.

We'd need a replacement as well Fjorty.

It shouldn't need repeating, but the only way he moves to Liverpool is if they offer a big enough transfer fee, and we sign a replacement. Liverpool shot themselves in the foot by jumping in to sign Ekitike so that was them who closed the door on Isak. They tried to be smart and play the power moves, well that has backfired.

Get over it man. He can go if Liverpool give us £175m and send us an official apology for hijacking the Ekitike signing.

This has been a concerted effort since PIF took over. None of them would sell to us in the beginning, now that we have a foothold they are using every other trick in the book. The dream for them would be for PIF to sell up and some shyster take over to lumber us with debt.

I liked Hojlund when they signed him tbf. Still think there's a player in there and has potentially less Nazi vibes than Sesko.

It's better optics than seeing him hold up a Liverpool shirt and their fans crowing about getting him for £120m.

Keep him engaged so there's a way back when the transfer to Liverpool doesn't happen.

The key was being able to spend their way into the stratosphere, something which has been blocked since PIF took over. No new owners will be able to do any different, I'm sorry to say. Far more chance they'll turn out to be spongeing vipers who will use the club as their own cash cows instead and lumber us with debt.

It's good that he's training tbh, he'll be fit to line up against Liverpool at St James.