£1m clause confusionNewcastle United’s bid for Neil Taylor suffers a legal hitch and apparently Darron Gibson is Pardew’s choice if he can’t get Sissoko.
Newcastle’s signing of Neil Taylor from Swansea appeared to be virtually done a week ago. The fat lady had not only sung but she’d retired, had three children and was now working in a kebab shop.
It seems that solicitors have braved daylight to get involved now though, which is rarely a good sign.
The dispute – as far as I understand it – is about the £1m clause in Taylor’s contract. Newcastle seem to think that this is a pukka release clause, allowing us to get the player if we bid that amount, whereas Swansea seem to think that the £1m bid simply gives us the right to talk to the player. (more…)
A bellyful of midfieldersNewcastle United seems to have been accumulating more midfielders recently, but does this give us a problem when it comes to keeping them all happy?
We seem to be on a mission to sign a fair few midfielders this transfer window. We already have Cabaye and Marveaux to add to the existing tribe of Ben Arfa, Jonas, Tiote, Barton, Guthrie, Gosling, Raylor and Ferguson. Not to mention Smith (and please don’t). And if speculation is anything to be believed we’re not done yet.
There’s still the possibility of signing someone like Sissoko, N’Zogbia, Matuidi, Barnetta or some as yet unknown midfield target. Adding just one more presents us with a problem. A nice problem in some ways, but a problem nevertheless.
The problem I’m talking about is who we leave out. (more…)
Alleged £6.5m bidNewcastle United allegedly bid £6.5m for Mevlüt Erdinç after having a £5m bid turned down.
Erdinç is one player we know for certain Newcastle have an interest in because Alan Pardew has admitted it. The Star, based on what they’ve gathered from ‘French sources’, has now come out and said that we are ‘closing in’ on the Paris Saint-Germain striker with a £6.5m bid.
I had a bit of a mooch around the French press – as I do most days – but I couldn’t find anything from this weekend about Newcastle’s interest in Erdinç.
Nevertheless, I do think we are most likely pursuing Erdinç and have a decent chance of getting his signature. PSG have previously said they want £8m for Erdinç, which is what they paid for him, and the recent investment of Qatari money into the club means they probably could hang onto him despite having brought in Kevin Gameiro (who, presumably, will be higher up the pecking order). (more…)
No bids, but is he up for sale anyway?Much confusion abounds at Newcastle United about the futures of Joey Barton, Jonas Gutierrez and Fabricio Coloccini, but it seems that a lot of the confusion has come about from one quote and an awful lot of hearsay.
Micky Quinn sparked up a bit of a storm recently by saying that he knew through a third party that Arsenal have enquired about Joey Barton. To be fair he didn’t say what they’d enquired about and maybe Arsene just wants Joey to feed his fish while he’s on holiday, although it’s reasonable to assume Quinn was talking about Arsenal enquiring about Joey’s availability for transfer.
This caused much discussion – particularly on Gunners’ fan boards – about whether or not Barton’s Arsenal material, how much he would cost and suchlike and so forth.
On top of that we had the Journal claiming that Jonas Gutierrez was next for the chop and then – somehow – Coloccini was added in as a potential leaver for good measure.
Yet with all three of these players there’s very little in the way of evidence to suggest that they’re either for sale or have attracted interest from other clubs, and at the end of last week a flurry of reports appeared suggesting that Newcastle have received no enquiries about Barton, Coloccini and Gutierrez. (more…)
Teteh and MohamedNewcastle United allegedly have much interest in Teteh and Mohamed Bangura who currently play for Sweden’s AIK.
You’ve probably seen various reports linking Newcastle to the Banguras from Sierra Leone who, incidentally, are not brothers. Both players are currently at Allmänna Idrottsklubben (AIK) in Sweden.
Let’s take Teteh Bangura first. The 6ft tall 21 year-old midfield/striker has a prolific scoring record with 58 goals in 67 games. Most of those goals have been scored in various lower leagues although he still managed a creditable 7 goals in 9 games for Sweden’s top division AIK.
Speaking in the Swedish press (which for some reason sounds like a torture device to me – don’t ask me why) yesterday, Teteh said:
“I like the Italian league.
“It’s good that clubs after me. It is the dream of every player to play in a better league. But right now I’m happy and pleased to be here.” (more…)
