With just over a week’s worth of unedifying wrangling left to go in the current transfer window, the coming days promise to be punctuated with no end of rumours and counter-rumours as the last-ditch horse-trading ramps up. Now in Saudi Arabia for warm weather training, team bonding and other quite specific football reasons, Newcastle’s already long shopping list got a little longer during Saturday’s hard-fought win over Leeds, as first Joelinton, then Jamaal Lascelles and finally Paul Dummett limped off with various injuries that could keep them sidelined for the coming weeks.
Unwanted by Tottenham, where his decline over the past two seasons has been little short of remarkable, Dele Alli’s “people” are reported to have opened talks with Newcastle on the subject of a loan or permanent move to St James‘ Park. The Magpies remain confident of securing central defender Diego Carlos from Sevilla, who are all too aware of the Premier League club’s desperation for new recruits and are holding out for far more than the £30m currently being offered presumably in the hope of getting far more when the inevitable panic sets in.
