Newcastle United are 'so close' to reaching an agreement to sign Yankuba Minteh from Odense Boldklub.
That is according to Bjorn Wesstrom, Odense's director of football, who was the first to publicly reveal that the Danish side were in 'close negotiations' with an unnamed foreign club on Friday morning. The mystery club, of course, is understood to be Newcastle, who have been tracking Minteh's development for several months now.
Negotiations are so advanced that Odense have taken the decision to leave Minteh out of the squad for Saturday's clash against FC Midtjylland. Although it is a huge game for OB, who are playing for a place in Europe, the club have also had to balance the risk that the highly-rated winger could pick up an injury.
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Odense, ultimately, felt they were closer to agreeing the transfer than to qualifying for the Europa Conference League. Wesstrom confirmed that there were still some 'small things' to finalise, but OB decided to omit Minteh at the weekend because an agreement was 'so close'.
“As always with a transfer, there are three parties who must be satisfied - otherwise there will be no transfer," he told Stemmer Fra Adalen "We have come so far that we took a player out of a match situation so it is clear that we are close to getting what we want.”
Minteh has made quite an impression in his first season in Europe, having been directly involved in eight goals in just 17 league appearances, following a move from his native Gambia last summer. However, Newcastle will almost certainly loan Minteh out if the mooted £5.8m deal goes through so that the 18-year-old can get the required experience to qualify for a GBE.
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