The Athletic's Chris Waugh has dropped a major claim on Newcastle's transfer budget following the takeover by PIF this month.
What's the talk?
Waugh has claimed that the Magpies could spend £200m on new signings before worrying about any Financial Fair Play regulations. The new owners are also able to invest as much money as they would like to in the infrastructure of the club without being penalised for it.
"The suggestion is that they could quite comfortably spend £200m before you can even really need to worry about FFP. Now that money does not include investment in infrastructure, or in the academy, or in the women’s team.”
Delight
Newcastle fans will surely be left delighted after reading these comments from Waugh. For starters, the fact that FFP has no say over how the owners develop the club off the pitch will be music to their ears as Mike Ashley failed to make the most of it.
In the 2019/20 season, the Magpies were rock bottom for infrastructure spend in the Premier League, with £200k spent.
Leicester, for example, spent £76.6m as they looked to build a top-class facility to go along with having a great team on the pitch. This should provide footsteps for Newcastle to follow in as PIF look to stamp their authority on Tyneside, with a brand-new training centre on route they could go down to ensure everything is where it needs to be off the pitch.
Newcastle supporters will also be buzzing with his claim about 'comfortably' spending £200m. This does not mean they will splash all of that money out in the January window, but it does suggest that the fans can get excited about some real investment in the playing squad in the next few windows.
Spanish outlet Fichajes ran a story earlier this month naming a number of players on PIF's watchlist ahead of the upcoming transfer windows. Chelsea's Timo Werner, Man City's Raheem Sterling, PSG's Keylor Navas and Real Madrid's Luka Jovic were among those included on the list of targets. It will be interesting to see if any of these players are actively pursued by PIF in January or if they will wait until the summer to make big moves.
AND in other news, PIF must secure £15m deal for "very mobile" £34k-p/w beast, NUFC fans would love him...