Maiga set for four and a half year deal at Newcastle

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Maiga set for Toon move
Newcastle are set to complete a deal to bring Sochaux striker Modibo Maiga to Newcastle in January, if reports in France are to be believed.

According to reports in L’Equipe discussions between Newcastle and Sochaux have been continuing despite the rather frosty relations between the two clubs after a summer of protracted transfer negotiations.

It seems as though Newcastle have got their man in the end though and Maiga looks set to sign a four and a half year deal in January and complete a £7 million move to St James’ Park before heading off to the African Cup of Nations with Mali.

Maiga has been in good goalscoring form this season despite the grief that he is getting from his own fans as a direct result of his antics over the summer. For those of you who are unaware just what the problem was, it stems from Maiga spitting the dummy out and refusing to play for his current employers thanks to interest from Newcastle – A tactic that backfired when a deal couldn’t be reached over the summer leaving Maiga high and dry and with few options after such a public display of disrespect to his current club.

You’d think he’d perhaps shut up after that debacle and keep his head down, but he then went on to antagonise the situation further by insisting that he still wanted to leave the club as he is ambitious and welcomed the jibes from his own fans citing that he was happy to be boo’d for having ambition.

Personally I think the attitude he has shown to Sochaux has been terrible, but I won’t let it bother me too much. The lad has said he wants to come here which is fair enough, but the problem will arise again if he is successful at NUFC. How long before he tries the same tactic with us?

Still that is a long way away yet and we need to first get him confirmed as a Newcastle player as, at the moment anyway, it appears to be just a rumour, albeit with stronger foundations.

We’ll see what happens in January.

About toonsy

A lifelong Newcastle fan and current webmaster of this very 'blog who has the sole aim of creating a place by Newcastle United fans, for Newcastle United fans.

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83 thoughts on “Maiga set for four and a half year deal at Newcastle”

  1. Defenders first please. One full back and one central defender.
    Then we can bring in petulant Maiga or De Jong or anyone else Pardew wants.

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  2. The jury is definitely still out on this kid… how old is he again? And why are we signing a striker in January who’s going to the ACN? Surely one of the main reasons we’ll need a striker is so they can come in and replace Demba?

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  3. HYDEOUS,i agree defender first but surely you would think pardew knows that,would go for cissie as striker imo

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  4. I guess Graham Carr rates him as the best forward available in the 7M bracket, which seems to be the amount allocated to buy a striker.

    With the players signed and the way the team are playing, I’m not going to complain.

    HWTL

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  5. No disrespect Devonmag, but if we sign a player on a 4-5 year contract to cover Ba this january then heaven help us. Fortunately, that isn’t going to happen. I am more worried about why we think this lad is worth buying, his record isn’t particularly good, and he’s shown this recent petulance. All our other signings I could see it, this one I just can’t. Cisse looks the better of the two. Certainly, can’t criticize what has been going on with our signings recently, but this does seem strange. I’d still like to think it’s a smokescreen so to get another player at the price we want.

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  8. I think this one could happen – he clearly wants to come to the Toon but the knob in charge of Sochaux could well pull the plug again
    Would like to see a left back in January as well. maybe they will go back for Pieters – wasn’t he able to play centre back as well?

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  10. think we’d be fools not to go for a cheap Pieters in Jan! Backline of:

    Santon–Colo–Taylor–Pieters

    Pure class!

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  11. He’s gona just love being sat on the bench isn’t he.

    Unless we brought in Messi or Higuain, I can’t see many new strikers leapfrogging what we’ve got, to be guaranteed a starting berth every game. And going by the apparent 4-7m budget we’ve got to strengthen that area I can’t see how any player would expect it.

    His apparent attitude is shocking. If we do sign him he’ll be a champion dummy-spitter before long. I’d be well surprised if we signed a player surrounded by controversy, it seems to go against everything we’re moving towards with regards to team spirit, work ethic, respect and humility.

    We’ll see anyway….

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  12. Geoff – hopefully the reason they’re going for the 7m maiga instead of te higher amounts for Ruiz/cisse is because they want to invest in the defence too :mrgreen: hopefully…..

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  14. Hi, good article, but just to correct(?) the assertion that he went on strike because we were interested etc..

    the ‘apparent’ real story is that the toon bidded, the bid was accepted, when toon met agent and maiga, the club (soch) decided they wanted e2million more (2 million euros) than was agreed

    maiga and his agent were rightly upset, toon refused
    he went on strike based upon he thought soch. acted ‘without care and respect; base dupon contact agreement he had with them.

    oh so we were told

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  16. ….who do you suggest wheresthe$$$$ashley?

    You can pretty much guarantee any British striker worth their salt will be massively overpriced and waaaaaay out of our budget range.

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  17. No way will we get a British striker, as Rod said, massively overpriced. That’s not how Ashley rolls.

    I don’t like the idea of bringing in this petulent trouble maker either. All the other players we have brought in are extremely professionally and understand that it just takes hard work sometimes, rather than blabbering your mouth off about something. That’s even evident in how our captain leads.

    Would definitely like another defender please, particularly Pieters would be great!

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  19. Not sure why people say his record isn’t good enough. it’s true he didn’t score a ton early on but he was used mostly as a sub. As a regular starter he scored 1 in 2 last year and has scored 4 in 6 so far this year.

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  20. Has to be for me ice. I was doubtful about maiga but started this season well after a good one last, and if chalkys version of events is close to the truth I don’t think the strike is unreasonable.
    The main thing for me is the defence though, maiga would be a nice bonus (and seemingly the most likely signing) but not the most important for me. I suppose the ANC will add a bit more urgency to the striker though in te new year

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  21. The thing is, no one was complaining when Ben Arfa went on striker and actually went one step further then Maiga and flew over.

    Can definitely see this one happening, all the journalists are saying it’s ‘almost certain’.

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  22. Not too sure on him to be honest.

    On one hand he seems to be a petulant sod who has seems to easily spit the dummy.

    On the other hand he is clearly rated by our scouts and they seem to know what they are doing. They’ve earned my trust anyway! Also Ben Arfa has been just as petulant and he is revered as some form of Jesus character by a lot of fans so what is the difference?

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  23. …there’s still time for Barfa to spit his dummy out Dan 😉

    I’d agree though, strengthening the defence has got to be of equal priority at the moment. I hope it is.

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  24. we were linked with Ricky lambert from southampton a month or so ago. personally i think he could do a job for us

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  26. I’m not familiar with him $$$, I would like to see a ‘native’ arrive at the club though. Are we in any danger of breaching the home-grown players ruling Toonsy? What’s all that about?

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  27. DUBTOON i worry if owt happens to colo or taylor which it will at some point who do play perch,kadar ect,maybe we would put santon in there,but its a worry imo

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  28. We have to trust Carr and his team IMO. They haven’t let s down yet.

    As somone said above, every striker we’ve been linked with has been for abouth 7-9M. If Carr et al say this is the best guy for that money, I will trust them.

    All I know about this lad is he’s got loads of pace, which would fit in well with the direction Pards seems to be leading us

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  30. We were linked with ricky lambert last christmas as well.

    He suits this ‘young and cheap’ mould but as good as he is the championship so you think he could cut the mustard witht the big boys? I’m not saying he couldn’t but moves like that are always a gamble 😕

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  32. Dan…there were a few peoplewho expressed reservations with Benny’s attitude 😉 ….wasn’t Benny also told he could go as he was surplus to requirements and find another club, which he did, then they pulled the rug?
    I just think we could do better than Maigi, Cisse would be my choice but has been said previously, Pardew and the scouts have done ok so far, so I’ll put my faith in them. 😀

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  33. I’ll take Rickie Lambert being young. I’m nudging 30 and he is a few months older than me so if that is young I’m happy with that 😆

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  37. ICEDOG@36 They’ve just put a spin on his quotes to get a sensationalist headline. it’s def not worth looking too deep into. 🙄

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  38. NOBBY i agree but what gets up my nose some are not happy when things are going well at the toon 👿

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  40. Ice…..Mad always use headlines like that, what Santon said is all good only the headline misleads as they always do. It does it’s job though and gets people to read 😉

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  41. so it looks like we have around 7mill to spend. Do we really need him tho? I’d say probably yes since we’re short on decent forwards.

    British please??… Like who for instance?

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  42. I wouldn’t sweat it Ice. He’s a young lad and things get lost in translation as well. He’s going to be a long time starter for an upper half Prem team. Surely he couldn’t ask for more than that at this stage of his career.

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  43. Ice i’d rather he took time and settled rather than play and be ****. No point him playing if he can barely understand man on.. Foreign players need time to adjust look at evra and vidic both **** first year now they are captaining man u. Same with colo and jose. I think this may also be why marveux is being eased in. It’s nice that we’ve got a team playing well enough to have the luxury of easing players in.

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  46. On maiga, havn’t seen him play before but our scouts have been watching him for a year that we know about so i think they must be pretty confident he’s got the ability. His records not that bad. Pretty much the same as gervinhos who everyone was desperate to get signed, me included. He also seems to be a pacy striker so is different to what we have, gives us another option and means sides won’t be able to play high lines against us. Wait and see i suppose. In carr we trust.

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  49. I really do hope we get him, anyone who Carr seems certain on we have to take his word for it.

    I don’t think his attitude will be a problem for us and with Maiga, Ba and Best with Ben Arfa and the Ameobi’s in and around them we have a lot of goals in the team/squad.

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  51. I keep hearing about why we should be buying UK strikers instead of foreign hitmen. Will someone please enlightem me as to who?
    Apart from the fact that too many of them are overrated, inconsistent and vastly over priced such as Whickham, Bent, Crouch etc. there are many others who are just not good enough like, Doyle, Johnson, Beckford, Bothroyd, Graham, Fletcher, Holt, Lambert etc.
    Yes there is Sturridge, Welbeck and Agbonlahor but we have as much chance of acquiring any of those as getting little Lionel himself to sign on the dotted line.
    Hoilett possibly but I think he’ll eventually go to the likes of Spurs and Arsenal.
    Give Maiga a chance – he could just be what we are looking for.
    In Carr we trust.

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  52. Preman…would be great to get Pieters, with him and Santon that’s all the back 4 positions covered.

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  54. Premandup, I hope we get Pieters. That one signing would strengthen our defense immensely!

    Doubt we’ll even talk to Barnetta now. I don’t see where he would get in with Obertan, Marveaux, Jonas, Ben Arfa, etc. already established in the squad come January. The only way I see us going for him is if we gain European football for next year.

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  55. @51. With English so expensive the club has done extremely well in finding great value in europe. Seems to me the only way to realistically bring in quality english players is to promote your own youth.

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  56. Would love to see Pieters in, more so than Maiga. Could we sign them both? Probably not without selling someone of value I reckon. Can we get a few million for Guthrie and Simpson?

    A backline of Pieters-Collo-STaylor-Santon would look pretty **** good

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  59. I’d rather not sell Guthrie as he and Gosling are out main CM back up. Although Abeid is developing very well, so we shall see

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  60. While we’re talking about defenders, anybody else think we should loan Tav out to a Championship club in the next half of the season, or would that be too much journeymanning for the young defender?

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  62. I think Guthrie’s on the last year of his contract anyway. Perhaps Forster will end up going. Not sure why else they would have brought in Elliot

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  63. Ice….can’t believe he filmed me having a kick about, I saw the one on the bike though 😆

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  67. Not sure what all the fuss is about with this guy. Does any other club rate him? Now I haven’t seen him play and Pardew and Carr have and I agree with TAKEN4MUGS. Sturridge is the only one on the list I’d be interested in and he’d cost an arm and leg. How come there’s no decent strikers left in England?

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  68. Gergio – The strikers in England thing is part of the game. Young strikers play, get hyped up, get over priced which has fed through to the point where it’s now cheaper to go abroad. Most of the young English strikers can’t compare with foreign ones so they see their chances limited meaning that they stagnate as a player.

    Carroll is the prime example of that. He can’t get in the team ahead of two players brought in from Holland.

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  69. Not sure what all the fuss is about with this guy. Does any other club rate him?
    —————————
    Don’t know, but did any other clubs come in hard after Tiote or Cabaye? I think we need to trust our scouting department which haven’t really left us down yet

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  71. Either in January or the summer;

    Forster, Perch, Lovenkrands, Smith, Guthrie, Simpson and Ranger will all leave in my opinion in that time. For about £6 million + a lot of wages.

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