Erikse

Just saw that Everton are linked with Wilson. Swap deal of the century incoming.

Mitchell will never be forgotten in Newcastle folklore if he manages to land this one before he's off.

Chelsea has been saving up some wiggle room the last few years, haven't they.

Man Utd spending 120m + huge wages right off the bat with no Europe money, nothing to see here. Why did I believe that they would only be allowed to spend about the same as us?

Man Utd are not in a position where they can keep hold on players with age on their side to reach the level of Isak.

6 goals in the league from 13 xG (from those 2 seasons). Been missing them east and west. It seems like Howe sees Osula as a winger currently? In that case DCL would be second choice. Not sure I like that. Wilson wasn't of much good use in that role the last 2 seasons. Not convinced DCL will be much better, despite it being a very low bar.

I agree with the last part, and said so myself. I was just a bit surprised by the fact that we only qualified twice through those 10 years or so. Not qualifying with second place seems brutal, and I had no idea that was a thing.

As mentioned earlier I wouldn't really care if we sold him. I just think it's more likely that we will keep him than what people think. Especially if he doesn't push for a transfer. It's more about discussing likelyhood than a wish from my side. That's all. I agree that he probably wants to leave, though, so all of this probably won't matter anyways.

If Tonali gets injured, Bruno plays nr. 6 and Longstaff most likely comes in for Tonali imo. This is literally how we set our team up for most games before Tonali came in. Longstaff was never going to come in for Joelinton when he got injured, because the balance was better with Miley/Willock alongside Bruno and Tonali. That can obviously change when a different player gets injured instead.

Position, whatever you want to call it. Bruno - Joelinton - Willock has never worked that well. I'd assume the same would be the case with Miley over Willock in that midfield. As such Howe has preferred Longstaff alongside Bruno as Longstaff can cover more room. Tonali was a direct replacement to Longstaff in the team. By the way. It's interesting that you talk about how useless Longstaff has been when playing lately, when you yourself points out that he has played 75 min in the last 20 games. Does that mean that your opinion about him as a backup as of late is based on those 75 minutes?

Which is completely in line with my comments about role, as Tonali has been fit through that period. If Tonali got injured instead of Joelinton, do you think Miley or Willock would have taken that role? I don't. I think the only reason he preferred Willock despite him not doing much either is solely because of position and complementing Bruno and Tonali. Why are we completely disregarding role as a factor, and think Howes squad selection is all about what players he likes the most? Everyone should know that this is not how managers picks the team.

I think most players will look bad when barely playing at all. Even Tonali looked mediocre until he got a couple of starts in a row. If Murphy had been an impact sub this season, I'm confident that we would have classed him as a Championship player right now.

We also gave up on players like Krafth and Lascelles as squad players, blasted them if they were rusty when given the chance, but when injuries struck and they got gametime it didn't take that long until they started playing pretty well with a run of games. We have a history on completely giving up on players only for this exact scenario to happen. I think you are really overexaggerating about Longstaff. He's not great, but he's not completely shit either.

I would also. Unfortunately Juve won't bail us out every window. Who knows, I can see some clubs wanting Longstaff. I can also see him not wanting to be a squad player. I can also see us keeping him, as I'm not sure we would get enough money for it to be worth selling (unless he really wants it).

It's besides the point anyways. Willock seems to be an alternative to Joelintons position in Howes mind. My point is that if we spend a bit on a midfielder, would it be one who would mainly challenge for Bruno or Tonalis position? That doesn't seem very likely. Replacing both seems nice and all, but we don't seem to be in the business of selling a bunch of squad players only to replace them in the same window. The thing is, we probably won't get mich for either of them, and we have so many other issues to solve. "Just replace them" is a bit more complicated than it sounds anyways.

As I said in the first post, I suspect that if we buy a midfielder, we would probably rather want a challenger for Joelinton. Someone who is more similar to Willock than Longstaff. Again, I doubt we would spend much on someone who would be sitting on the bench for Tonali. Hence my assumption about wanting to spend more on a player who would be playing in Joelintons position. He's the most replaceable, the one you could actually rotate, and also the one who is more prone to injuries.

Howe usually doesn't want to play young prospects in the first season. Especially not ones in that price range. He would much rather play someone like Longstaff. I think there's a misunderstanding here. I'm not worried about losing Longstaff because he is a great player as of today. It's about his role when he's playing. For instance I would much rather sell Willock. Not because he is way worse than Longstaff, but because I doubt we will sign a player that can cover Tonali in the same way as Longstaff (and ofcourse the injury record). As an example, I remember how the Willock - Joelinton - Bruno midfield looked good on paper but in practice it didn't look all that great.

Until we get injuries that is. Remember what happened last time we were in the CL? We can't afford buying 10 players. Selling Longstaff certainly wouldn't give us much funds to replace his squad place anyways.

I agree, I thought the same (Bruno going into the 6 role). At the same time if we look past this season, we've historically had some very good form periods with Longstaff playing alongside Bruno, with Bruno playing as a 6.

Not thrilled about keeping Longstaff, but if Tonali gets injured, wouldn't he be the current best option to fill that role? My guess is that if we buy someone, it would probably be a challenger for Joelintons role. A similar type to Tonali would just be on the bench most of the season, unless ofcourse Tonali gets a longer injury (he doesn't seem prone to them). I think Longstaff will stay unless he wants to go himself, or we get a pretty good bid (the latter being less likely).

Just read about it after your post. Without knowing all the context, it seems wild to collectively punish the entire PL for it.

Yes. However only one of those times we didn't get CL. The other time we did. My wording was just a little confusing, I didn't mean to say that we finished 2nd only once.

Yeah, it doesn't say anything about qualifying rounds either on wikipedia. Just 2nd and 3rd, and then Europa League next season. We did get into the CL with a second place finish in 96/97. Keegan finished top 3 twice without getting us into the CL, so the comparison is a bit unfair as we finished 5th this season.

Just noticed that he's the first Newcastle manager to reach the CL twice with us. Outside of the one time we reached CL in the 90s, we somehow had a 2nd and a 3rd place finish with both resulting in the Europa League? How did that happen? I was born in the 90s, so I don't have a clue.

The guy clearly haven't seen Jacob Murphy this season.