According to The Mail’s Craig Hope, Bournemouth are now in talks to re-sign Matt Ritchie – but no agreement has been reached between the two clubs as of yet.
The 31-year-old has regularly been linked with a move back to the South Coast in recent transfer windows, with him tipped to join The Cherries when we were negotiating a deal for Callum Wilson last summer.
Ritchie signed a new deal at St James’ Park just 10 months ago, but has become a bit-part player in recent months, starting just once since the turn of the year and playing just 16 minutes of football in our last four games.
Interestingly, The Sun’s Alan Nixon stated after last weekend’s defeat to Aston Villa that we’d been considering a potential part-exchange with Bournemouth that could see them sign Ritchie and us get Danish midfielder Phillip in return.
It remains to be seen if that’s something we are pursuing, with Josh King another who we’ve been heavily linked with in the past, however it does feel like this is the beginning of the end for Ritchie at Newcastle United.
Not only is his game time diminishing and his ability to cut it at Premier League in question, it seems he wants a move South for one reason or another?
Should his exit allow us to sign one or two first team players in the final five days of the January window, I wouldn’t be against it and would wish him all the best.
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When we’ve been looking to the players who fight for the team recently there are moves to lose arguably the most passionate team member we have. I just don’t get it.
Tony Toon(Quote)
U wouldn’t mind aginst it wtf…he is the only footballer with intellectual understanding of the game ..matt,haden and fabin are the only players left who know football the rest are lucky to play in epl 😉
Henock ETHIOPIA(Quote)
I would rather have Ritchie at left wback than lewis,he has passion can cross a ball and tackle, good luck for the future you have been a good player for nufc and always gave your best ,well done mate.
Bill Burn(Quote)
There’s a lot of talk about passion when we should be talking about skill.
When we were relegated there was a discussion between Rafa and Ashley about getting us back up straight away. Rafa said at the time that there was a huge difference between winning in the Championship and winning in the Prem, so Ashley agreed to let him buy the players he wanted to get us back up, then spend again to rebuild a premiership team.
Ashley reneged on the second part of that deal.
I bring this up because Ritchie was brought in as a scrapper to get us back up. That’s what he is a rough edged Championship player.
Personally I would rather have players who are skillful than passionate. You don’t get much for being the most passionate team in the second division.
As an interesting add on to the that – other players brought in by Rafa as Championship scrappers included Gayle, Hayden, Clark, Lazaar, Yedlin and Atsu. All Championship standard players that we have had to rely on for Prem survival.
I’ll give Clark credit – he’s developed into a decent Prem player but the rest are still Championship quality.
No – I don’t rate Hayden.
Obviously Ritchie wants to go home so good luck to him. Home being the Championship.
Helen Clarey(Quote)