Newcastle United are targeting Nottingham Forest’s Ross Wilson for their sporting director role, and he would arrive with some impressive pedigree in the transfer market.
Indeed, Newcastle United need to find a replacement for the outgoing Paul Mitchell. After just under a year in charge, Mitchell will leave Newcastle at the end of June.
While owners PIF will back Eddie Howe’s judgement in the transfer market, they will need to appoint a new sporting director at some point.
Newcastle sources are interested in Wilson, who has held high-profile jobs at a number of other clubs.
In fact, it was what he did while at Southampton that should seriously excite Newcastle fans.
Newcastle United target Ross Wilson signed Virgil van Dijk for £13m
As per a BBC Sport report from 2015, Wilson was heavily involved in the £13million deal that took Virgil van Dijk from Celtic to Southampton that year.
The Dutchman, of course, would go on to break a world record less than three years later when Liverpool paid £75million to sign him, making him the most expensive defender in world football at the time.
“It’s not rocket science,” he said after signing the defender.
“I oversee the process and we have a team of scouts who are constantly looking at players within their territories. They know the attributes we’re looking for at Southampton, which is part of our identity, so they know what a player needs to be able to do in each position.
“But alongside that we’re speaking to agents, we’re doing due diligence into their background, finding out about their character, speaking to people who have worked with them before. So it’s just building that whole dossier, while the analysts are building a technical profile alongside that, looking at his statistics and comparing them with other targets.”
Why Ross Wilson’s genius move would help Newcastle United
The PIF era at Newcastle has been one of success in the market. Very rarely have they made a mistake when actually signing players.
However, having players leave the club has been an issue. Mitchell said Newcastle’s transfer policy was “not fit for purpose”, while Newcastle sources were disappointed Dan Ashworth couldn’t sell players for big money.
Player trading is a big part of modern football. If Newcastle can unearth gems like Van Dijk and sell them on at some point, it helps keep money coming into the club.
Newcastle, of course, don’t want to become a selling club when it comes to their best players. However, at some point, one will leave.
| Player | Fee |
| Elliot Anderson | £35m |
| Andy Carroll | £35m |
| Yankuba Minteh | £32m |
| Moussa Sissoko | £31.5m |
| Ayoze Perez | £30m |
| Georginio Wijnaldum | £24.8m |
| Allan Saint-Maximin | £23.2m |
| Yohan Cabaye | £22.5m |
| Aleksandar Mitrovic | £22.2m |
| Chris Wood | £25m |
Liverpool sold Philippe Coutinho before buying Van Dijk and Alisson, two signings which led them to the Premier League and Champions League titles. Even Manchester United sold Cristiano Ronaldo while still at the height of their powers. Change does happen eventually.
Newcastle just haven’t been able to turn such a huge profit on a player over the years. They theoretically could with the likes of Alexander Isak, but he’s just too important.
On paper, moving for a talent-spotter like Wilson could help the club find more players like Isak. That could then mean they are not overly reliant on just a few big-name players, but could go on to boast a changing cast of stars who could come in and improve the team before being sold.
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