Do Newcastle have an ace up their transfer market sleeve?
Posted on July 5th, 2010 | 25 Comments |
The goalposts have moved, slightly, from just scraping the bottom of the free transfer barrell to a now more widely recognised notion that we do have at least some money to use in the transfer market. I doubt it will be a lot, and in fact I very much doubt there is a budget as such, more likely a deal will only be sanctioned if it offers good value for the club, well that is my opinion anyway.
But does Chris Hughton have an ace up his sleeve? He has been keeping his cards close to his chest all summer long, and even recently called for privacy on the transfer front whilst he conducts his business. There is none of this drum-banging going on, like say at West Ham, who are spouting off about multi-million pound bids left, right and centre, which has amounted to them doing less business than us throughout the summer. No, no, we amble on quietly, frustratingly quiet, although Hughton has admitted that he is surprised by the calibre of player that has become available, players that he never thought would be available in the first place.
“Where we are at the moment is we’re making enquiries and beginning to make decisions on players but we are making progress. What happens over this period of time is that there are people that we have looked at and people that have become available that we believe are of the required quality to add to our squad.”
“We’re getting plenty of phone calls at the moment from agents and from clubs and among those there are plenty of names that are now available that perhaps weren’t on our radar before.”
So there is a bit of the same rhetoric from Hughton, with an added hint that new players are on the radar, players that he wouldn’t have expected to be available. Things need to start moving forward though, and the time for talking is running out. Pre-season training begins today, and I personally hoped we would have at least a couple of new faces in already in an attempt to get them integrated into the squad. Hughton knows best though, or does he?
There had been a bit of news last week regarding PSG forward Mevlüt Erdinç, and an apparent bid from Newcastle that has been rejected. How true that was in the first place is another debate entirely, although Chris Hughton has said that he isn’t generally looking abroad for players.
“We’ve not particularly targeted foreign players, but we’re open to anything that may improve our squad,” said Hughton. “That includes the Championship, free transfers and loan players too. We certainly won’t rule out looking at the Championship if there are players we feel are ready to step into the Premier League.”
As I said earlier, we really need to kick on with our recruitment drive now and add to the imminent arrival of James Perch from Nottingham Forest. The World Cup, the anti-christ to transfer windows apparently, is nearly over and the squad is back together for training, so everything is in place to start hearing of any more new developments.
We’re ready, you’re ready, but is the club ready?
NUFCBlog Author: toonsy
toonsy has written 643 articles on this blog.
Hughton has stayed true to his public comments since he’s been skipper. In regards to transfers that has been thy are looking to sign young, complimentary players, and that they will take their time in doing so. So I would expect a couple more, maybe a loan, and then ready for the season.