Newcastle United will almost certainly not sell Alexander Isak this summer, and that is very understandable, given the 25 goals he scored last season. St. James Park paid £63 million to Real Sociedad for the Swede two summers ago, and they’ve seen some great return on their investment.
Of course, everyone has their price however. Chelsea are said to be in talks with Newcastle, but the egregious transfer fee makes one believe Chelsea can’t really afford it.
According to the Daily Mail, Isak is probably worth double what Newcastle paid for him right now, and that means Chelsea would have to break the club transfer fee record- the £115m that they paid Brighton last summer for Moises Caicedo.
Don’t rule it out; not just yet. After all, Todd Boehly and Clearlake Capital have already broken both the summer and the winter transfer spending records. Elsewhere Yankubah Minteh is holding up the potential deal that would see him join Olympique Lyonnais.
Lyon submitted an offer of about £40 million to Newcastle, who agreed to seal the deal.
However, Minteh refuses to leave the Premier League. He shot down both this transfer and the contract offer. Instead he wants to join Everton FC. Coming Home Newcastle has more over at this link.
Paul M. Banks is the Founding Editor of The Sports Bank. He’s also the author of “Transatlantic Passage: How the English Premier League Redefined Soccer in America,” and “No, I Can’t Get You Free Tickets: Lessons Learned From a Life in the Sports Media Industry.”
He currently contributes to Ravens Wire, part of the USA Today SMG’s NFL Wire Network and the Internet Baseball Writers Association of America. His past bylines include the New York Daily News, Sports Illustrated, Chicago Tribune and the Washington Times. You can follow him on Linked In and Twitter.