Cabaye, Gameiro, Gervinho etc. – just what’s the situation?
Posted on June 6th, 2011 | 154 Comments |
As another week gets underway, we can no doubt expect a load more transfer speculation relating to our club because it is after all silly season.
So I thought I’d kick off by doing a brief summary of where we supposedly stand with some of the transfer targets rumoured to date.
First of all, let’s be clear about one thing: the club have not confirmed a single transfer in and have only confirmed the exit of Sol Campbell and Shefki Kuqi, so that is our official transfer status at the moment.
Mehdi Abeid
By all accounts this is actually a done deal and the player himself has confirmed that he has agreed a deal with Newcastle after being welcomed and encouraged by Tiote and Ben Arfa. The 18 year old attacking midfielder has played most of his football for the Lens B team, so I’m guessing he’s down as one for the future.
Yohan Cabaye
This is also looking likely – although not 100% certain – to be a done deal. Cabaye told his manager that he was off to Newcastle and his manager announced that at a press conference after Lille’s last game of the season. We have allegedly acquired the 25 year-old box-to-box midfielder for about €6 (£5.2m) via the release clause in his contract and it is said that we have signed him for 4 years.
Kevin Gameiro
Apparently Lille accepted our €11m (£9.8m) offer for the 24 year-old striker-cum-winger but the player has voiced a preference to play either in Spain or for one of the big French clubs. He is apparently coming to St James’ Park this week and Pardew, Llambias and co will have a chance to persuade him to sign, but it seems increasingly likely that he’ll be going elsewhere.
Gervinho
Sky Sports recently announced that our €16m (£14.25m) bit for the 24 year-old striker means that his arrival on Tyneside is ‘imminent’, although that may be somewhat optimistic. I can’t help but feel a player of Gervinho’s calibre would be demanding European football and with Arsenal allegedly ready to bid €17m for him, I’m more inclined to think that’s the sort of place he’d go.
Neil Taylor
It seems that Newcastle surreptitiously found a £1m buy-out clause in the 22 year-old Swansea left-back’s contract and intend to use that to bring him to St James’ Park. All the press reports have been about ‘intent’ rather than ‘actually signing’ but – personally – I think this is the sort of signing we’d pull off.
Charles N’Zogbia
The 25 year-old winger has been connected to us since January when we allegedly made a last minute bid for him in the winter transfer window. Allegedly Wigan have refused the first two bids we’ve made – for £5m and then £6m – and Dave Whelan is playing hardball over the player’s transfer to us. The Zog has expressed an interest in coming back to Newcastle via Twitty or similar.
Junior Hoilett
The 21 year-old Blackburn right winger is allegedly interested in a move to Newcastle and is apparently on Pardew’s wish-list, albeit as a second choice, but all we have is press speculation about our alleged interest in the player.
Shane Long
Reading’s 24 year-old striker is apparently of great interest to Alan Pardew and the Reading chairman has all bit accepted he’ll lose the player this summer. Celtic, however, looked to be in poll position to get the player according to the latest rumours.
The Rest
There have of course been plenty other rumours of Toon interest – Ba, Cole, Erding, Boudebouz and even Berbatov, for example – but they have so far failed to generate much momentum.
Outgoing
In terms of outgoing players, we know that Campbell and Kuqi have gone and yesterday there was speculation that Ranger will be shown the exit this summer. Enrique has of course been the subject of much speculation, mainly involving Liverpool, but apparently the club is still trying to pin him down to a new contract.
Nolan and Barton are allegedly not being offered new contracts at the moment. Barton has said he wants to run down his contract at Newcastle and there were rumours that Nolan is ‘considering his future’ but time will tell in that respect.
Now that the French season has finished and the internationals are out of the way, we should begin to see a bit more progress on the transfer front.
Have a good week everyone!
i WAS feeling confident of some of those players…..but now you’ve planted the seed of doubt.
I am still hoping Gervinho will sign. Would love Gameiro (but only if he WANTS to come, otherwise, he’ll be here for a year, have a good season, and take the first train out of Central Station as soon as he gets the chance…sound familiar to anyone (Bassong!).
Still, you gotta love/hate this time of year!