Kieran Trippier says that he did not even contemplate requesting a relegation release clause the moment he swapped sunny Madrid for Newcastle United last January - because he knew that Eddie Howe would steer the club to safety.
Howe will celebrate his one-year anniversary as Newcastle sitting in a European place with the position all very different to when Trippier first put pen to paper when United were second bottom of the table. Yet Trippier, who worked with Howe at Burnley, had full confidence in the plans moving forward.
Trippier told Chronicle Live: "He was a big part of my decision to sign. I had big long conversations with the gaffer about the way he wants the club to run, the way he wants the thought process to be in the long run. I didn't sign anything like a clause if we got relegated I'd go, there was nothing like that. I believed in everything that the gaffer said and everything that the owners said. I just thought 'Why not?' you know."
