Today is of course, Transfer Deadline Day, although it will be taking a back seat tonight as Newcastle host Southampton at St James’ Park in the Carabao Cup semi-final second leg.
For now though, things are quietly ticking away in the background as clubs scramble to get last-minute deals done and ratified before the 11pm deadline.
Does that include Newcastle? Well, it doesn’t seem like it so much.
Outgoing transfers appear to be done with the Karl Darlow deal agreed to be concluded after tonight’s game, and Jonjo Shelvey is all done and dusted at Nottingham Forest, just waiting for the official announcement on that one. That will likely be the only exits we will see today as any more would weaken our squad too much.
As for incoming, that’s slow too. It seems like the interest in Sander Berge has died down, and the Norwegian is training with Sheffield United today. Sky Sports are reporting that Manchester City have entered the race for James Maddison, which will massively complicate matters for us, especially if they move for him in this window.
It seems as if Newcastle were willing to play the long game and go in for Maddison again in the Summer, but if City come in now, that option could be taken away from us. I think if City are also going to wait until Summer, we’d still have a chance as we’ve already seen the bond he has with Kieran Trippier, Callum Wilson and Nick Pope from their time in Qatar, plus we’d be able to offer him a bigger guarantee of first-team football.
The Mail Online have had this to say about Manchester City’s Maddison interest, which reads a bit more positive to me: “Manchester City are interested in a move for James Maddison this summer, while Premier League rivals have enquired about the availability of the Leicester playmaker this month.
The Premier League champions, who have let the disgruntled Joao Cancelo depart for Bayern Munich, will have to be active ahead of next season, with the futures of Ilkay Gundogan and Bernardo Silva up in the air.
City hold an interest in Borussia Dortmund’s Jude Bellingham but have also identified Maddison, with Pep Guardiola wanting more goals from those behind Erling Haaland.”
The other deal potentially in the works is a loan move for Chelsea’s Conor Gallagher, although Chelsea are adamant they will not loan him to us as they see us as a direct rival. They could be willing to sell, but the price would be ridiculous – £50m or so according to Sky Sports’ deadline day live feed. Of course, with Chelsea possibly signing Enzo Fernandez today, that could force their hand as they’d need to let some players leave due to squad size and an increasing wage bill, so this one isn’t dead yet.