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Optimistic Nut

by Optimistic Nut
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JonBez comesock

JonBez comesock

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, KaKa said:

Wouldn't be surprised if something has been lost in translation somewhere and it's actually some Saudi club trying to sign Kvaratskhelia.

I was thinking exactly the same 

 

it won’t be us bidding £80+ million 

 

Probably a mix up / Saudi team interested 

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gdm

gdm

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2 minutes ago, JonBez comesock said:

I was thinking exactly the same 

 

it won’t be us bidding £80+ million 

 

Probably a mix up / Saudi team interested 

Not even Saudi clubs would expect him to go there at age of 22. The story is likely just made bollocks rather than any translation error 

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SUPERTOON

SUPERTOON

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Just now, gbandit said:

Hmm, worrying comments if that’s the case. Unless it’s an acceptance and frustration at FFP rather than anything in our control 

It can’t be a frustration at the club, they have backed him with close to 300 million. 

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gdm

gdm

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7 minutes ago, gbandit said:

Is he talking about his own frustrations and dark days or talking on behalf of someone else like ASM?

“At times there have been frustrations and dark days,” Eddie Howe told reporters on Saturday, describing Newcastle’s strange summer of recruitment.

After the elation of brokering a £52m deal for Sandro Tonali from AC Milan, the Rolls Royce midfielder Howe craved, Newcastle have seen targets James Maddison and Dominik Szoboszlaijoin top four rivals Spurs and Liverpool respectively.

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gbandit

gbandit

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1 minute ago, SUPERTOON said:

It can’t be a frustration at the club, they have backed him with close to 300 million. 

Sure, I imagine the overall feeling is one of being massively supported but you never know, if he’d said “my top target is Maddison” and he got overruled by others saying he wasn’t a priority and there was an internal battle about that then I could see how that could lead to frustrations. This is all just meaningless speculation but Eddie’s normally very tight-lipped, seems unusual for him to talk like that 

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Jack27

Jack27

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GATESHEAD – It has been football’s summer of Saudi spending but at Newcastle United, the Premier League club that is majority owned by the kingdom’s Pubic Investment Fund (PIF), the talk is of enforced austerity.

“At times there have been frustrations and dark days,” Eddie Howe told reporters on Saturday, describing Newcastle’s strange summer of recruitment.

After the elation of brokering a £52m deal for Sandro Tonali from AC Milan, the Rolls Royce midfielder Howe craved, Newcastle have seen targets James Maddison and Dominik Szoboszlai join top four rivals Spurs and Liverpool respectively.

PIF’s deep pockets may be disrupting the summer transfer market elsewhere but Newcastle find themselves hemmed in by the constraints of the Premier League’s Financial Fair Play rules. Their net spend since the 2021 takeover is in the region of £300m and senior sources say that is “unsustainable”, even with the promise of Champions League funds to come.

The club’s wage bill has also outgrown their revenues and the same insiders say it will take time to address that. Their favourite saying is that this is a long-term project that will bear fruit but Howe has more immediate worries.

“We know the challenges that we face and through the summer I’ve been through all the emotions,” he said.

“I’m very pleased to get Sandro (Tonali) in but we know we need more.”

He was standing on the running track that circles Gateshead’s International Stadium, half an hour or so after a Newcastle side that featured four left-backs and no senior strikers eventually prevailed over spirited Conference opposition.

With 28 days to go until the start of the new Premier League season it’s clear the pace of progress in the transfer market hasn’t been quite what Howe desired. Newcastle need more quality and strength in depth if they are to maintain the remarkable progress of the last 18 months.

“I’m patient and understand the parameters we’re working in but I also know the needs we have,” he said.

“For me it’s not a case of we want to do it, it’s what we need to do it. And being a coach I want them on the grass available now so all of those things go together. We have a very strict budget that we’re trying to work within. Always with FFP, there are certain things you can be creative on but we don’t have a huge budget to work with.”

Newcastle want to sign Harvey Barnes from Leicester and sources suggest the deal will progress. But Howe said on Saturday “nothing” was imminent and repeatedly emphasised Newcastle’s budget is not as big as other clubs presume.

The club’s CEO Darren Eales would say these are “champagne problems” – Newcastle’s unexpected success creating the need for greater strength-in-depth to cope with the demands of midweek European assignments while maintaining Premier League progress. But the sobering fact is top four rivals are strengthening and Newcastle need to find a way to do the same.

“With the competitions that we’re in, having three games a week we need to be able to rotate the team but to be able to bring in players who are of equal standard,” Howe said.

“That’s what we’re looking to do but we know we have a lot of work to do to do that. Players are expensive these days. We’re working within FFP guidelines which is very difficult for us. We might need to be creative, but we’re trying to look at every avenue we can to make the club stronger.”

One option is to sell players but Howe repeated his desire to retain Allan Saint-Maximin, one of the few players in his squad who feels expendable and would command a sizeable fee.

There is interest in Saint-Maximin from Saudi Arabia but nothing advanced at this stage.

The Frenchman led the second-half fightback in tumultuous conditions on Tyneside, Newcastle eventually winning 3-2 against Gateshead after suffering the wrath of Howe for being two behind and sloppy at the break.

“I love Allan, I’ve said that many times,” Howe said.

“You saw his quality, when he went to his best position as a left winger I thought he was excellent. He took his goal really well, he’s come back in a good place mentally.

“I’m very pleased with him.”

Cynics would say that one avenue open to Newcastle would be to sell their unwanted players to the PIF-owned clubs in Saudi Arabia who are throwing cash around and have already helped soothe Chelsea’s FFP concerns.

But Newcastle sources are quick to point out they are separate concerns, with Al-Hilal, Al-Nassr, Al-Ahli and Al-Ettihad all run by management companies that have no connection to the Magpies.

“Anything we do will be in Newcastle’s best interests,” was what Howe said when asked about the possibility of conducting business with Saudi sides.

Newcastle’s issues are all relative, of course. Tonali stood in the stands on Saturday and has impressed in his first few days. His English is improving and he breezed through Friday’s fitness tests.

“Sandro is one of those players who can elevate everyone around him. He’ll fit in really well to how we play,” Howe said. A few more of those, though, would not go amiss.

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STM

STM

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Must.fill.column. inches.

 

They have never let him down. They won't start now. YAR will rock up with the cheque book and all this FFP talk will look a bit silly.

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Tsunami

Tsunami

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We’re definitely playing the we aren’t an open cheque book and FFP is clearly an issue. We need to get revenue in and “be creative”. 
 

The spending of other clubs is a worry, they’re strengthening at a rate we can’t keep pace with. 
 

We perhaps need to draw a little breath, reflect on how far we’ve come in so little time and accept we might need to go back a little and still keep ahead of schedule.

 

We’re years behind in having the full set up required to trade players without real constraint. We might even benefit from that in terms of team spirit and continuity. We’ve been far better than the sum of our parts since Eddie came in. I’ve no doubt we’ll do all we can to get the right players in for the right positions.

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