One of the players Newcastle United regretted selling when trying to sign Bastian Schweinsteiger has taken a major step towards breaking a Premier League record.
These days, Newcastle United largely keep their best players and have generally found a lot of success in the transfer market in the PIF era.
That, however, hasn’t always been the case. In fact, the 2008 decision to sell James Milner for £15million still looks rather strange.
The England international has gone on to huge success since leaving St James’ Park, winning three Premier League titles and the Champions League amongst a raft of other cup trophies.
Now, the 39-year-old is closing on the Premier League appearance record after signing a new one-year deal with Brighton.
James Milner close to breaking Premier League appearance record
Milner is on 638 appearances in the English top flight and will stand a good chance of breaking Gareth Barry’s record.
Former Aston Villa, Manchester City and England midfielder Barry’s total stood at an impressive 653.
Now, Milner is just 16 appearances from breaking the record. Still, he only had four Premier League outings during the 2024-25 season amid various injuries, so will need to improve on that.
The next highest active player for Premier League appearances is Ashley Young on 485, although he is now without a club after leaving Everton.
Why Newcastle United thought they could replace James Milner with Bastian Schweinsteiger
Milner first left Newcastle on loan in 2005 as part of the deal that brought Nolberto Solano back to St James’ Park from Villa.
The Birmingham club signed Milner on loan, but he returned to Newcastle the season after before moving back to Villa Park on a permanent basis in 2008.
Speaking on the Liverpool 5 Times Podcast in 2016, former Newcastle assistant manager Terry McDermott confirmed the club sold Milner as they believed they could replace him with then-Bayern Munich star Schweinsteiger.
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“We were actually at the club when we sold him, myself and Kevin Keegan,” he said.
“We sold him for 15 million quid.
“The story goes – and this is a true story – we didn’t want him to leave but we needed to get other players in because we’d had a bid of 15 million quid.
“Kevin said ‘if we sell him for 15 million quid, how are we going to replace him?’
“They said ‘we’ve already got one – Schweinsteiger’. Seven or eight years ago he was a superstar and they said we could get him.
“The idea of accepting the bid of 15 million for Milner, which was a lot of money then, and then we’re looking to get Schweinsteiger it’s a no brainer.
“But after he’s signed for Villa – the day after – we’re trying to sign Schweinsteiger and the answer was ‘absolutely no chance, it will cost you £50 million if you wanted to buy Schweinsteiger’.
“So we had no one to replace him. But he was irreplaceable anyway because he could play anywhere.”
Schweinsteiger was one of the most high-profile central midfielders in Europe at the time, later becoming a legend with the Bavarian giants and he won the World Cup in 2014 with Germany.
He eventually got his move to the Premier League, but a two-year spell at Manchester United between 2015 and 2017 did not work out.
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