According to The Mirror, Celtic’s Kristoffer Ajer will become Steve Bruce’s first signing of the summer transfer window in a deal worth around £6m.
The 6ft 5′ centre-back has been regularly linked with a move to St James’ Park since the turn of the year and appears to have been watched on several occasions by head of recruitment Steve Nickson.
After a host of reports last week stated we were ‘pushing on’ with our attempts to sign the 23-year-old, the Sunday Mirror now state he ‘will sign’ for Newcastle next month – suggesting a fee of £6m has been agreed.
£8m was the initial fee suggested by the likes of The Mail and the Daily Record, however the Norwegian is entering the final 12 months of his contract at Parkhead, giving us some leverage in negotiations.
It’s also said that he’s eager to sign at Newcastle and sees it as the perfect move at this stage of his career, with it previously reported that he’d chose us over the likes of AC Milan and Norwich City.
Time will tell if these big claims are in fact true – £6m does seem very cheap for a man compared to Van Dik by some in Scotland – however it is very clear at this point that he’s a summer target and someone we’re looking to snap up ASAP.
Fingers crossed on this one, as it’d be a shrewd signing and the addition of a centre-back who offers something many of ours ageing options lack – pace, height and quality on the ball.
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Aye – it’s always a good move to stick somebody who’s never played in the Prem in the middle of your defence! What could possibly go wrong there?
That said we had Shelvey as centre back last season.
Nice to see we’re sticking to our guns with the negotiations and only paying 6 million when Transfermarkt have him valued at 3 and a half?
No wonder Celtic are glad to let him go.
Freddd(Quote)
Southampton signed VVD from Celitc having never played in the PL for £14m & sold him to Lpool for £75m – but your transfermakt site only has him valued at £63m now so maybe Saints were pleased to get rid of him ??♂️.
Sharpy17(Quote)
The lad is a stand out player for Celtic who clearly thinks he can play at a higher level – £6m for a 23yr old who is already very experienced is an excellent bit of business imo.
Good start to the summer window & nice to see some early action from the board.
Sharpy17(Quote)
How vmany times do we read things like this only to see the player go elsewhere. Lets wait until its confirmed. We have a budget of 10 mil, were spending 6 on this guy who is a good player and i personally would like him, however, its evident from many of our performances we are toothless in midfield and weve got nothing up top when Wiulson is injured. Check his injury record (its the only reason we have him here) it’s inevitible hes going to pick up injuries as he always has done. So although a defender who is tipped to be very very good is a great signing in some respects, it shouldnt be our priority right now, we need another midfielder and another striker, possibly someone who can play on either wing, as in my opinion thats where weve been pathetic at times this season. The defence in my opinion hasnt done badly considering were on the backfoot and having to defend for 60-70% of every game weve played. Several of our previous defences would have caved much more frequently than this one has.
John(Quote)
I agree.
Journalists relying on newspapers for Transfer news is pretty amateurish though. Lazy also.
Cocobear(Quote)
Sounds good to me getting in on an ageing defence,now go for Armstrong at Blackburn ?,and an attacking midfielder if we can’t get willock back on loan, like the sound of Robert’s from Leeds if it is ture
Martin Souter(Quote)