We reported recently there were several clubs interested in signing 26 year-old Newcastle striker Emmanuel Riviere, who we bought from Monaco two years ago for £6M.
The French striker has not played at all for Newcastle this pre-season although it looks like he has still been injured, but in any case he is not in Rafa’s plans at Newcastle and will be allowed to leave the club if we get a decent offer for him before September.
Emmanuel Riviere – in action for Newcastle
Newcastle will be looking to recoup the £6M we paid out to bring him to Newcastle, but Manu’s been a disappointing acquisition by Chief Scout Graham Carr.
France Football are reporting that Bundesliga club Hamburg are interested in signing the 6ft tall striker, who has scored 3 goals in 28 appearances for the Magpies.
Hamburg have some older strikers on their books and they are looking to bring in the 26 year-old to add some youth and physical prowess up front.
The fee is said to be €7.5M – which converts to £6.38 – so that sounds about right.
Riviere will be happy enough that clubs are interested in him this summer and two top clubs said to be keen to sign him include Greek side Olympiacos and his former club AS Monaco.
We’d be surprised if As Monaco are really interested in their former striker however, after he had had a poor two years on Tyneside and he’s been injured a lot of the time.
Newcastle want to transfer the 26 year-old permanently or send him on a loan – with an obligation to buy when he’s played a certain number of games.
The main thing is to get the striker off Newcastle’s wage bill for this season.
Other players still likely to leave Newcastle before the end of the transfer window are 30 year-old holding midfielder Cheick Tiote and 26 year-old French International midfielder Moussa Sissoko who is hoping his dream club – it’s now Real Madrid apparently – will sign him.
Transferring those two well-paid players will help to further decrease the Newcastle wage bill and keep it at least manageable for this season down in the Championship.
But the Mirror’s report today that Rafa Benitez wants to sell top striker Aleksandar Mitrovic before the end of this transfer window because he doesn’t trust him to keep his cool in games – appears to be totally inaccurate.
That’s good, because we need players who can put the ball in the back of the net and Aleksandar could have a stellar season for us this term.
The 26 times capped Serbian international scored 9 Premier League goals in 36 appearances for us last season.
Comments welcome.
97 comments so far
Jib
Aug 8, 2016 at 7:31 AM
Comment #81https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VK4WpDTPIGg
Just look at the number of times Daryl does really well to get up the field – the box is loaded with attackers and he opts to corner flag and put in an easily snuffed out high cross , when a cut into the box and pass to feet would be much more of a threat – á la the classic buccaneer that is Dani Alves.
He’s kind of halfway to being a swashbuckler then falls at the final hurdle.
It shouldn’t be really necessary to have to clarify this on a footy blog.
However Tsunki’s dislike/jealousy of me sometimes causes him to reveal he doesn’t really know much about football.
Tsunki would make a great captain of the England sneering team.
Lilongwe Geordie
Aug 8, 2016 at 7:38 AM
Comment #82Not been on since Friday, not sure it is fair knocking Moussa for talking of Real Madrid as a ‘dream club’. They are. To almost every professional footballer. I doubt any of our players would speak differently on them. Hopefully with the Pogba deal almost complete, we will start to see this issue resolved one way or the other. It would make Juve the most likely suitors, although AC Milan are about to spend big on transfers according to papers.
€7.5million for Rivi? Wow. That is probably an even worse deal than £35million for Sissoko…. Still, let’s hope it is true, and not just paper talk.
Pleased the club have dismissed the notion of selling Mitro. We will need him. Occasional rash challenges, yeah, but only 4 yellow cards aside from his reds shows that he is able to control it. 9 goals for a kid in a new league at a team relegated is also a pretty impressive haul.
Galloway would be an excellent addition, hopefully on a permanent basis. Then we need a further winger, a striker and dependant on the winger, we still probably need a bit more creativity.
Ron Knee
Aug 8, 2016 at 7:46 AM
Comment #83Lilongwe
Isn’t two red cards in one season a lot, though?
The overrated Frenchman
Aug 8, 2016 at 7:50 AM
Comment #84Jib@81. A decent comment, although I disagree with it, but worthy of a considered response, which makes a nice change. Janmaat obviously has a good engine. He keeps getting forward for 90 minutes and puts in a shift in that way pretty much every match. You can question the quality if his crosses overall maybe, but if you seriously thought our box was “loaded with attackers” against Fulham you should go back to rugby old son. I have no issue with criticism of his defensive capability, but his forward forays at least create opportunities which are few and far between otherwise with this squad. I’ll say that applies to life under Pardew, Carver, McClaren, and Rafa so far. (nb. please don’t insult our collective intelligence by citing the goalscoring feats pre-season)
Tsunki
Aug 8, 2016 at 8:00 AM
Comment #85Jib must have learned his football from the great Pardew, he’d have us believe that our Right Back should be our winger and part time AM, Matz Sels should be bombing up for every corner and what about Anita covering for goal at the same time? No mention of how energy levels are going to be conserved for example. Or why our specialist attacking winger should be spending even more time covering for our RB while he “Gets into the box more”. 🙂
Jib
Aug 8, 2016 at 8:02 AM
Comment #86“Loaded with attackers ” was a reference to some of the Youtube vids.
My comments on Janmaat were a generality not Fulham specific.
I think Sissoko will end up replacing Blaise Matuidi at PSG when BM goes to Juve.
Jib
Aug 8, 2016 at 8:04 AM
Comment #87Tsunki immediately does an audition for captain of the England sneering team.
I think you’ll be a shoo in me old fruit. 🙂
kilcline
Aug 8, 2016 at 8:17 AM
Comment #88Sell Sissoko and show some ambition….
Go all out to sign Gray from Burnley and Knockaert and both will be good enough for the prem. Galloway would be first choice left back here no problem.
YouCouldn'tMakeItUp
Aug 8, 2016 at 8:31 AM
Comment #89Morning all.
Did anyone else see that gumtree add for sissoko yesterday?
Jib
Aug 8, 2016 at 8:33 AM
Comment #90Kilcline
Scott Hogan from Brentford would be worth a punt – he had a nightmare couple of seasons with 2 ACL’s and hamstring trouble but the second half of last season was back to sensational form.
martoon
Aug 8, 2016 at 8:35 AM
Comment #91Morning guys for people who don’t scan through previous posts – for anybody interested I’ve done some analysis on the predictions – note that to prevent the averages being skewed I’ve removed a couple of the more ridiculous predictions i.e. 148 points??
152 posters gave predictions (very good effort ? )
Average league position = 1
Average number of points = 99
Average League Cup round = 5 (last 16)
Average FA Cup round = 5 (Quarter Finals)
Top choice for POS = Richie with 38.8% of posters
2nd top choice for POS = Lascelles with 19.7%
Top choice for TGS = Gayle with 56.6% of posters
2nd top choice for TGS = Mitrovic with 28.3% of posters.
Average number of goals for TGS = 23
Jib
Aug 8, 2016 at 8:37 AM
Comment #92Twisty faced footballer for sale
🙂
Jib
Aug 8, 2016 at 8:38 AM
Comment #93Gumtree pulled the link last night before I could post it
🙁
YouCouldn'tMakeItUp
Aug 8, 2016 at 8:40 AM
Comment #94Jib
Aye, thats the one. It’s been taken off now,so I cant post the link for anyone who hasn’t seen it. Anyone on Facebook can see it on “Newcastle United Times” page, though.
Jib
Aug 8, 2016 at 8:40 AM
Comment #95For sale:
Moussa Sissoko.
Performs 4 or 5 times a year. Excels under spotlights and in front of TV cameras
YouCouldn'tMakeItUp
Aug 8, 2016 at 8:41 AM
Comment #96Martoon
Good work, mate. Some of those prediction already look a little ropey, now :-O
Jib
Aug 8, 2016 at 8:47 AM
Comment #97I still have a sneaky feeling we may get Abel Hernandez from Hull