Work permit issues end Toon interest in Bangura. Erdinç decision expected today.
Posted on July 29th, 2011 | 34 Comments |
You have been spared my rambling nonsense for a few days due to the village I live in once again having had its telephone exchange stolen. To be more precise, it’s the copper wire that links the exchange to the houses in the village that was stolen. It’s really getting tiresome. I’m now on first name terms with some of BT’s customer service staff who are, I must say, polite, courteous and completely useless.
But I’ll spare you a rant about that and move on to Newcastle instead.
News hot off the (Daily Mail’s) press is that we’ve ended our pursuit of AIK striker Teteh Bangura after work permits delayed talks. The Mail has suggested that Manchester United are now interested in the player and that scout Martin Ferguson is off to watch Teteh play this weekend.
The Mail, as usual, merely reports these things in omnipotent fashion without any quotes or other evidence to back them up, so it wouldn’t surprise me if it’s complete and utter tosh. I find it hard to believe that something like a work permit would ‘delay talks’. If no work permit was likely at all for the player then, sure, no transfer would happen, but a mere hitch with said permit is, I feel, unlikely to remove a player from our list of targets.
Anyway, it’s a shame because I feel either of the Bangura’s would be good acquisitions. Both are young, reasonably prolific scorers and would, I think, cost a fair bit less than Mevlüt Erdinç.
As Jimbob reported, Newcastle are still waiting on a decision from Erdinç and apparently we’re pushing to get it by the end of today, although I’m not sure what we’ll do if such a decision is not forthcoming. Pardew has intimated that he has other irons in the fire, although – with over a month left in the transfer window – I suspect the club would be inclined to wait a little longer for their first-choice striker (by which I mean the first-choice of those that haven’t already snubbed us).
I’m not subscribing to the idea that he doesn’t want to be here and that we should tell him to shove it if Newcastle United isn’t his first choice. Firstly, rumours about things like that can be played up by players’ agents as they try to secure the best deal they can for their client and, secondly, even if we are his second choice, it’s just the way football is these days. Once a player gets here I’d expect him to commit to the team and, who knows, maybe Newcastle will then get under his skin and he’d be glad he came to his second choice club after all.
Anyway, he wasn’t our first choice!
So we may or may not hear something about the Erdinç situation today but I won’t be holding my breath.
I must admit I don’t like the funny ‘ç’ at the end of his name though. I have been tempted to follow the lead of others and simply use ‘Erding’ instead of ‘Erdinç’ but that struck me as somewhat disrespectful. It would be like calling me ‘Hugg’ instead of ‘Hugh’.
NUFCBlog Author: Hugh de Payen
I'm a baby-boomer of the punk rock persuasion, currently exiled in Somerset for crimes committed in a previous life where locals keep trying to poison me with something called 'scrumpy'. Hates sprouts, coat-hangers, Cilla Black, ornaments, Steven Seagull movies and 50 Cent (he's not worth 10).
Hugh de Payen has written 634 articles on this blog.
any minute now, really reallly, any minute now?…god im bored of hearing about it, he better set the pitch aflame with his skills to warrent this kinda build up