Exciting signings are coming - Why Newcastle are in safe hands this summer
Social media and Newcastle United transfers. Don’t you just love this time of the year?
Last season has only just finished and already the rumour mill is in full swing this summer, with lots of fans like me scouring X (Twitter) and Facebook each day for the latest news on potential incomings.
After the disappointment of last summer’s non-event of a transfer window, and the subsequent miraculous achievement of Champions League qualification (we were 12thin the league after a 4-2 away defeat to Brentford on the 7thDecember) fans are right to be excited about the summer ahead.
Like previous summers, the club have already been urged countless times by fans on social media to sign specific players for whatever amount of money it takes. Bryan Mbeumo springs to mind. He's already become this summer's go-to name.
My message to fellow supporters is que sera, sera, whatever will be will be. We’ve never had this much competency over transfers in our club’s history. Trust the club to get it right.
Since the takeover took place and Eddie Howe came in, I’m struggling to think of a bad buy we’ve made. Every player they’ve bought has contributed significantly to the success the club has gone on to have over the past three years and 192 points later.
If you compare this to other clubs who have squandered hundreds of millions of pounds on relative duds (Mudryk to Chelsea, Antony to Man Utd, Nunez to Liverpool), we’ve got pretty much every marquee buy right. Yes we've not made enough signings in recent windows and that must change this summer, but that was largely down to PSR; which is not the same issue it was 12 months ago.
Our success rate on transfers has been absolutely incredible. The club has proved they know what they’re doing and deserve your trust. Yet on social media Eddie Howe seems to have garnered a reputation for only buying British, Premier League proven players.
When presented with signings such as Bruno Guimaraes, Sandro Tonali, Sven Botman and Alexander Isak, where is the evidence for this? Is it coincidental that our upturn in fortunes has come since he took charge? Yes, he’s supplemented those buys with a core group of English players (Pope, Trippier, Burn, Gordon etc) but so did Bobby Robson 20 years ago (Woodgate, Bowyer, Bellamy, Bramble, Jenas, Cort to name but a few) and he also took us to the Champions League.
We have a manager who is not only meticulous on the training pitch, he’s meticulous on transfers and talent identification too. When we buy players, it’s clear and obvious we’ve scouted them extensively and we’ve done our homework on them (a 10 month Sandro Tonali betting ban aside). Let him and our scouts do their work. Especially Steve Nickson and Andy Howe, who are clearly brilliant at their jobs and see potential in players like Desire Doue and Hugo Ekitike long before they go on to showcase their talents on the biggest stage.
We are not only buying players for the here and now, we’re buying for the future too and developing those players through great coaching into elite players. Buying Anthony Gordon at 21, Tino Livramento at 20, Lewis Hall at 18 as well as Sven Botman and Alexander Isak at 22 are all evidence of this strategy in play. This should help to give us long term success.
If we don’t buy a soon to be 26-year-old Bryan Mbeumo, don’t be surprised, just know that club has a plan, has done its research and more often than not we get it right under Eddie Howe off the pitch and on it.
