Yanga-Mbiwa and Pieters eyed as Colo and Simpson replacements?
Posted on November 23rd, 2011 | 76 Comments |
The last flurry of transfer speculation about Newcastle was mainly about attackers and, in the interests of balance, the press have been hitting us with speculation about defenders – either new or current – over the last few days.
The Daily Mail and The Sun, for example, have us interested in Mapou Yanga-Mbiwa, which is easy for them to say. He’s 22, plays for Montpellier and is a naturalised Frenchman originally from the Central African Republic, which is a place I really like on account of it being exactly where it says it is. A sort of geographical onomatopoeia.
Anyway, Yanga-Mbiwa started out as a right-back and has more recently played as a centre-back, which is the sort of versatility managers like. He’s been at Montpellier for his entire footballing career and has also notched up 8 appearances for France’s under-21 team. Arsenal were linked with the player, who is contracted with Montpellier until June 2013, at the end of last season.
‘Transfermarkt’ values him at £5.3m but – based on nothing but the signs in my tea-leaves – I reckon that’s a bit high. He seems to fit the profile of the sort of player we buy, although that’s hardly an argument for the validity of the rumour, which, as ever, remains dubious.
Rumours about our interest in Erik Pieters seem to be continually on the boil too. In fact, our interest in the player is beyond the rumour stage as it seems we did indeed try to prise the player away from PSV in the summer. I tend to think that, as with Modibo Maiga, there’s a good chance we’ll continue to try and lure him to Newcastle in January, although whether or not we’ll be successful remains to be seen.
I think the club has good reason to be jittery about the defence because both Fabricio Coloccini and Danny Simpson are procrastinating over signing a new contract. The Sun carried a report on the weekend suggesting that Simpson’s agent has told him to press for more money, but Pardew voiced his stance on the matter as follows:
“We’ve made Danny an offer which I think is a good offer, if I’m honest. Like everything it’s very difficult to understand value when you’re a young player. You see other players at other football clubs and you hear rumours, etc etc.
“I think Danny should commit to the football club because he’s done terrifically well here and the one thing I do know about young players in the Premier League, you can get lost quite quickly.
“He doesn’t want to do that, he’s found himself a nice berth in the club. He’s keeping out Davide Santon, who we’ve paid very good money for; he’s a new father, he’s doing particularly well.
“Sometimes the grass isn’t always greener and I would advise him to get his contract done ASAP.
“Danny needs to remember he’s playing and getting valuable experience in the best defence in the Premier League.”
So it sounds like Pardew is getting a little impatient with matters. Simpson and his agent should know by now that ‘holding out for more money’ is generally a flawed tactic at Newcastle and players that try that often find themselves replaced by young, less expensive French-speakers in double quick time.
The last I heard on the Coloccini situation was that he wants to ensure that whatever deal he strikes up with Newcastle allows him the financial scope to continue funding an orphanage for 160 kids in Argentina, so hopefully something can be worked out with that.
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.
I would imagine both will be on their way in the window, Ashley see’s everything as profit and loss. We will remain on this Merry Go Round until he has recouped all his money and then we might get sold-on if we’re lucky!
I think a lot of us are starting to realise this is what the future holds.
It will be impossible to keep any continuity, but if we stay up (which we should do!) Mad Mike will see it as a successful business plan!
He’s not interested in football, he’s a Spurs fan after all!