Amanda Staveley has revealed that Sven Botman was ‘desperate’ to join Newcastle United in January and is still “very much” keen on completing a move to Tyneside this summer.
Speaking to The Athletic’s George Caulkin, she has also confirmed that Jesse Lingard wanted to seal a move to St James’ Park – saying they “did everything” to make that deal happen last month.
The NUFC co-owner also reveals that we did make a late attempt to sign Hugo Ekitike; the Reims forward who looked set to seal a deadline day move at one stage before deciding to remain in France.
Here’s everything she had to say on the transfer front in her latest must-read interview – which we plan to cover in full over the coming days:
Amanda Staveley on our attempts to sign Sven Botman and Jesse Lingard:
“There were times when I was screaming at agents. I think Eddie heard me using a word I would never normally use!”
“We were also 19th going into the window, so we had that, an illiquid market and the complexity of COVID, which meant clubs didn’t want to sell because they didn’t know where their squads would end up.
“We had to encourage players — ‘we’ll be a safe place for you, we’ll deliver and grow’.
“Some desperately wanted to come to us, like Sven (Botman), who still does very much and has talked very openly about that.
“Coming through all that showed us we can do it, that we can stick to our plan and if we get criticised on the last day for ‘oh, you’re going after Jesse (Lingard)’, well, Jesse wanted to come to us.
“We did everything. We never stopped. From the start to the finish, we did not stop working.”
Amanda Staveley on our pursuit of Hugo Ekitike:
“We’d looked at every single available player in Europe, America, everywhere.
“There were some younger players we wanted to bring in like (Hugo) Ekitike.
“But he wouldn’t have been one for today, he would have been an investment for the future.”
