Newcastle have two major targets this week and they are Spurs and England winger Andros Townsend and West Bromwich Albion striker Saido Berahino.
Newcastle are in negotiations with Tottenham over Townsend, but Spurs Chairman Daniel Levy as usual is trying to drive a hard bargain and wants around £14M for his England winger, whereas the news is that Newcastle have offered around £10M and had that offer rejected.
Saido Berahino – Newcastle want to sing this young striker
Other clubs are interested in the 24 year-old winger so Newcastle cannot dilly dally too much and it may be we have to pay more than we wanted for the England International.
But with the instant success of Jonjo Shelvey on Saturday, Newcastle will know Andros can immediately contribute to the side and help us avoid relegation.
And that´s the number one priority for Newcastle this January.
Andros can give us something we don’t have – an out-and-out winger who can create and score goals and he would be another good signing for us.
The time Papiss Cisse will be sidelined keeps changing from anywhere from four weeks to two months, but Newcastle know we need another striker brought in, even though both Mitrovic and Perez played well for us on Saturday and Mitro shows signs of improving at the club – he was unlucky not to score against West Ham.
But with West Brom finally admitting that 22 year-old striker Saido Berahino is now for sale Newcastle will make an effort to sign the striker this week.
West Brom manager Tony Pulis has said this about Saido:
“With Saido, it has been disruptive from the first game of the season,” “He was undoubtedly our best player last year, and one of the main reasons the club stayed up, and to not have him in that form has been a massive miss.”
“We don’t know what is going to happen yet. If a club comes in and actually buys Saido we will be in a position to talk about it. Nobody has done that yet.”
“He is a West Brom player, but every player is for sale if the price is right and the club deem it to be right.”
There’s an invitation right there for Newcastle to go in with a firm bid.
Sadio will cost upwards of £18M and Andros will cost up to £14M so we are talking of Mike Ashley shelling out over £30M in the final two weeks of the transfer window.
And if we cannot get Saido in, then former striker target – Swansea City’s Bafe Gomis – will be a fall-back option and he can do a job for us this season and next season too, as Perez and Mitrovic are given time to come through.
He has a release clause in his contract for £7M – but he seems expensive at 30 years old.
It would be much better to pay up for Berahino because this lad is a good player and needs to get away from West Brom.
Newcastle now need to show real ambition and try to get Andros and Sadio signed this week, although there could be competition from both Spurs and Leicester City – two clubs much further up the table than Newcastle at the moment.
If we can do that – it will go a long way to ensuring Newcastle are a Premier League side next season and we all want to see that happen – and sooner rather than later to make it easy on the nerves.
🙂
The £8M deal for Cheick Tiote to Shanghai Shenhua is very likely to be completed early this week and will help Newcastle possibly get Townsend and Berahino through the door.
Here’s hoping.
What do you think?
Comments welcome.
26 comments so far
expatmag
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:04 AM
Comment #1Wait for it
We just couldnt get them over the line
Reyantoon
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:07 AM
Comment #2It’s Berahino then.The expected new striker.
He looks small & physically thin though. So not sure about him.
And no negative news on Shelvey-Valencia incident. Hope it stays quiet & dusted that way.
sing in the corner
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:12 AM
Comment #3I’ve got a nagging feeling that these two potential deals are in the very risky category. Berahino could be amazing but also could be a flash in the pan – put that with his strongly rumoured attitude, likely wage demands and diva issues and upwards of 18mill has a bad smell to it.
Townsend is inconsistent, Poch knows a footballer when he sees one so Levy can keep him and we’ll keep wor 14 mill. No need to panic buy now, better to get players who really suit our needs or keep the powder dry.
toonincheek
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:15 AM
Comment #4sing @3
Yep
JDdubai
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:15 AM
Comment #5The management are in danger of actually living up to their promises this season.
They said we would invest and it would be over 3 transfer windows, last summer and january look like backing this up. We are starting to look at english players too which is a bonus.
They said we would put out strong teams in the cups and take them seriously. Both teams we put out, Sheff Wed and Watford were strong tems. Sadly we were utter crap vs Wednesday and couldnt score the goal we deserved vs Watford but that comes down to the players on the pitch.
If we get 2 more this month and stay up, the summer could be a very exciting time. Even better with Saylor, Obertan, Willo etc finally out of contract and off the wage bill.
nufc 11
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:19 AM
Comment #6Wilfred bony would be better money spent also buying a striker now without giving armstrong a run and signing a striker who will be in his way next season could be a bad move Remy on loan would be ideal.
Lindisfarne
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:20 AM
Comment #7N-R-G
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/newcastle-united/12104333/Has-Steve-McClaren-formed-a-team-Newcastle-supporters-can-love-again.html
jazzyp
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:21 AM
Comment #8If anyone would have said we would buy Shelvey…Townsend…Berahino in one transfer window. And spend over 40 mill a couple of year ago.We would have all laughed and said ya need to be in loony bin asylum
Lindisfarne
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:22 AM
Comment #9Any top ten team needs four strikers to progress through a whole season.
banjax
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:23 AM
Comment #10Buying players from the premier league was never going to be cheap but they are good to go from day one and in our relegation threatened predicament they are much needed. I think we should go to £12m for Townsend and no more but as for Berainho I’m not convinced. At this moment a loan deal for Remy would do for me and go for a quality defender instead and look at striker options in the Summer. PS David Gold couldn’t have said it better about C. Austin a £4m fee is no good if the club has to pay £100k per week wages !
Lindisfarne
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:25 AM
Comment #11We are the Loony Toons!
Comical, slap stick and outrageously expressive to the core.
Spoof
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:25 AM
Comment #12Cabaye done all he could to force a move away from us, but I wouldn’t say he has a bad attitude, and at only 22 he has time to mature, I am more then about Townsend as £14m seems a lot of money for him.
jazzyp
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:28 AM
Comment #13Tiote deal to be completed today for 5 mill….Ssn
Lindisfarne
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:29 AM
Comment #14Tell that d#ck Levy that he can have £12M , as Townsend is not worth more than Shelvey but every hour they delay a£100,000 comes off.
will die for the toon army
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:30 AM
Comment #15JDubai
The 3 windows will work and we will have a better squad after we realise all the deadwood.
And as i said we thought Mccaz job would be easy and it was about spending money and we move on. It was harder than that he had a team with no foundation and no ambition. With the signings we r making we have shown ambition. And we have a half team pulling together.
CApt. Colo is improving with his leadership skills and its also showing on pitch.
Lindisfarne
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:31 AM
Comment #16Spoof – 22! what planet are you on!!
Toon-Prodigy
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:33 AM
Comment #17Whatever happens this window it dosn’t take away the absolute dross and mismanagement of the last 7 years. The neglect of the first team and the lack of backing managers.
We are getting excited but really what is happening now should be standard in this day and age in the Premier League. We have watched promoted clubs and others which we know are not as big a scale as Newcastle drift pass us with little to no effort involved at all.
jazzyp
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:37 AM
Comment #18Happy birthday to Peter beardsley… 55 today
Spoof
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:39 AM
Comment #19Lindisfarne
It’s true, he obviously wants away and feels that WBA are hampering him,similar to Cabaye, all we hear is what the clubs want us to hear, what we do know is that he is a good player and we need as many of them as possible, lets worry about attitude when we have the chance to see it for ourselves.
will die for the toon army
Jan 18, 2016 at 8:52 AM
Comment #20I still believe in Mitro and he should stay our no. 1 striker the goals will come.
Hope we can get a prolific championship striker as back up to Mitro. Jst like Gustede of Aston Villa
SA Toon
Jan 18, 2016 at 9:13 AM
Comment #21With our dismal record of signings throughout the Ashley era, I am always excited about new talent coming in. We do need to be careful though that we don’t get too carried away and start undermining the progress that the team has been making. We need to consider the impact that each new signing may have on existing personnel and make sure that they compliment (rather than demotivate) the current squad. For example, I would hate to see Mitro (who, I think, is playing a crucial part in our recent resurgence) or Ayoze, being sidelined by the introduction of new players and becoming despondent. I know it’s difficult to get the balance right because we do need further strengthening, but it needs to be done carefully. So far I think we’ve done well, and I only hope we’re now on an upward trend. Swansea go down tonight, and then a win against Watford on Saturday and we’re really on our way! HWTL
magpie0722
Jan 18, 2016 at 10:07 AM
Comment #22At £14 million they should forget about Townsend and go for one of the Ayew brothers, better still both. They have proved they can play in the premier league and are both stand out players for their respective teams. As for our supposed interest in Gomis I really hope that is a non runner, I’d rather Adam Armstrong got the chance to show if he can step up.
west777
Jan 18, 2016 at 10:24 AM
Comment #23you be lucky to get berahino .. as for small and weak comment your wrong u don’t know a decent striker as probably you don’t know your mom either
Sav
Jan 18, 2016 at 10:47 AM
Comment #24Fans on here are far from convinced by the quality and the character of Berahino and Townsend. There are better out there and we are in danger of doing the very thing the club has said it doesn’t want to do – panic buy in January. If this is at the cost of proper building in the summer, keep our powder dry. If we are going to buy, there’s better out there than these two.
Berahino – does that mean dropping Mitrovic or Perez? How are they going to improve? Aarons is almost fit again and we buy Townsend?
wynsleap
Jan 18, 2016 at 11:20 AM
Comment #25Must say I’d go for Townsend, fast, tricky and direct and knows the way to goal. (Obertan but with brains). Maybe like Shelvey he has a point to prove and where better than at SJP?
Not so sure about Berahino – looks a bit small to me and seems to have been sussed a little by premiership defenders after an excellent earlier scoring run.
Gomis? No way – Big and bulky with a limited shelf life. Far rather see us push the boat out properly and land Lacazette or, if not, Bony.
Looking ahead to the summer window that would leave us only to purchase a top class left back and central defender. Watch us go then the following season.
Ahmad Tabanjeh
Jan 18, 2016 at 4:29 PM
Comment #26berahinoo is not the right choice for Toon. Mitro and Ayoze are still better than him, but if we want to bring a goal scorer player we have another options that are stronger than berahinoo with same price like ighalo or laukaku