Toon to strengthen at right-back?

Posted on September 6th, 2011 | 9 Comments |

Newcastle looking for a right-back?
January target?
Newcastle United a reputed to be looking to strengthen things at right-back with Manchester City’s Nedum Onuoha allegedly being in the frame for a January transfer.

I’m not entirely sure where the rumour came from originally, but there’s one on a mild simmer about us being in the market for a new right-back.

Actually, come to think of it, it probably started when Danny Simpson was allegedly on the verge of signing a new contract earlier in the summer but for some reason didn’t. Simpson is contracted with us until the summer of 2013 and has been the subject of the occasional bit of transfer speculation, although nothing substantial enough to class our need as ‘desperate’.

Whether Simpson stays or goes, though, I can in fact see the need. We seem somewhat short of defenders just now and I think the right-back position could do with some more competition. Come to think of it, our defence could do with a few more numbers in general. A couple of injuries could easily put us in the mire and the fullback positions in particular seem to be undermanned. Besides Simpson and Santon, I guess there’s always Perch, and both the Taylors can fill in at fullback in an emergency, but I would hardly call that ‘depth’.

Anyway, on the weekend the Sunday Sun claimed we had more than a passing interest in Manchester City’s Nedum Onuoha who, the Sun alleges, City would allow to leave on a free. That might in fact be the case as he’s clearly surplus to requirements at City as he spent last season on loan to the Mackems. Apparently he’s a ‘January target’ for us, although I must admit I don’t really want to think about January just now – it’ll take me until then to recover from August!

Nedum Onuoha 24 years-old and of Nigerian descent. He has played 21 games for Englands U21’s, although he has apparently said that he hopes to play for Nigeria at senior level.

Meanwhile, back at the Bat Cave, Alan Pardew is still maintaining a silence about transfer window matters, although The Chronicle reports that he is said to be both ‘devastated’ and ‘furious’ at the lack of incoming personnel on the final day, particularly personnel of the goal-scoring variety. The Chronicle doesn’t make is clear how it knows this though: telepathy perhaps, or maybe just the sort of educated guess and fool could make. Even the fool writing this article.

No doubt we’ll hear from him in due course. I think we pretty much know the sorts of things he’s going to say anyway, although it’ll be interesting to see if he toes the party lines as much as usual.

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.

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Comment on this post

9 Responses

  1. we cannot pay 6M for Pieter, why can Onuoha ? His price will not less than 10M. Don’t think it will happen.

  2. @1 the artice says city will be willing to let him go for free.

    the word FREE will have Ashley Zinging and bouncing, in addition to the cook fiasco i think he is out of the eastlands any way

  4. to be honest after the whole ordeal of the ast couple of months of us being linked with hundreds of players would only care if i see a player holding a Newcastle shirt standing in front of the east stand with Newcastle united in the background(dread to think a sportsdierct@st james park),also to don’t really care about future incomings as we have until January and need to supports our guys until then will be tough without a main striker but im sure we can hold out if we support our lads,which we will of course :)

  6. U must be stuck for players to talk about because going after a player of that quality is going backwards……. Had potential and it never happend….. Bad bad move imo

  8. I think R.taylor would slot in at RB quite well, probably even better than he has done at LB his defending isnt a whole lot worse than simpsons but he also gives us good free kicks and has already scored 2 goals in 4 games for us and without that top top striker we need more goals from the rest of the team.

    Onuha is really good and was playing really well until city bought in so many stars and now difficult to get a start ahead of them all. he is also still young and fits transfer profile but he is probably worth more like 3-4 mil as he hasnt played for so long.

  9. Nice post, love a bit of transfer speculation. I think we have a lot of cover at RB (Simpson, Santon, Raylor, Saylor, Perch, even Gosling can fill in there).
    That having been said, i think Onuoha would be a great signing. More-so as a CB, an area which was highlighted as being worryingly thin. The fact he can also cover both fullback positions for me is bonus. Nedum’s temperament is exemplary, from what I’ve seen, and would be a great addition if we can pull it off.