Newcastle United just about made it to the other side of an important June 30 deadline.
Indeed, until a relatively late point of last month, Newcastle were said to be needing to raise funds in order to comply with the Premier League’s Profit and Sustainability Rules.
They do not allow clubs to lose more than £105m over a three-year accountancy period, with the club risking a ten-point deduction had they not complied. The deadline for getting those numbers balanced was at the end of June.
Eventually, Newcastle got there by selling Elliot Anderson and Yankuba Minteh to Nottingham Forest and Brighton respectively.
Dan Ashworth was also allowed to join Manchester United after months of talks and Newcastle eventually reportedly brought in more than they actually had to.
Still, it seems the frantic nature of the June period did not go down particularly well amongst owners PIF.
What PIF didn’t like about Newcastle’s transfer business recently
Such was the pressing need to raise money, Newcastle even held talks about selling Anthony Gordon to Liverpool before they were able to bring in funds from elsewhere.
Selling Minteh and Anderson is no doubt more palatable in the short-term compared to allowing either Bruno Guimaraes or Alexander Isak to go but its difficult to put a positive spin on it in the long-term, with both youngsters rated very highly.
Speaking about the departures of Amanda Staveley and Mehrdad Ghodoussi not long after those sales, journalist Duncan Castles has revealed that the owners did not like the rushed nature of it all.
“The feeling amongst the Saudis, I understand, was that Staveley and Ghodoussi were too eager to spend heavily early and hope to sort out the problems when the problems came down the line,” he told The Football Transfers Podcast.
“And they did not like what happened in June. And they want it done on a more structured fashion.”
PIF have already hinted at a change at Newcastle
Reflecting on the dual departures last week, chairman Yasir Al-Rumayyan vowed to focus on the “long-term, sustainable success for the team.”
Now, that may sound like a relatively obvious thing to say but the kind of mad scramble we saw last month would not appear to fit into their vision for the club.
With that in mind, it seems Newcastle are vowing not to ever get into that position again, with PIF having more of an influence going forward.
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