Eddie Howe breaks silence on Newcastle United quadruple transfer blow as one signing confirmed
Newcastle United head coach Eddie Howe made his transfer market frustrations clear following the 4-0 friendly defeat at Celtic on Saturday.
Newcastle’s first pre-season match in front of a crowd saw 10,000 travelling supporters sent home disappointed as Celtic strolled to a comfortable win at Celtic Park.
The Magpies were without Alexander Isak and Joelinton for the match. Both players were rested after recovering from injuries over the summer while Isak was sent home by Howe amid speculation surrounding his future at Newcastle.
Ultimately, the Newcastle boss expects the striker to remain at Newcastle and make the upcoming trip to Asia, but his absence did little to hush the transfer noise surrounding the player.
For Newcastle it’s disappointing that all the transfer noise at the moment is about failed signings and potential outgoings from the club rather than incomings. Less than a month before the start of the season and halfway through the summer transfer window, The Magpies have just one major signing to show for their efforts.
And Howe admitted he hoped he would have more signings through the door at this point in the transfer window.
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Eddie Howe discusses ‘difficult’ summer so far
Newcastle have signed Anthony Elanga for £55million so far this summer but the 23-year-old remains the only notable signing so far.
“I wish I could give you some kind of guarantee that all that's going to happen, but I can't. Yes, my wish was for us to do our business early, and we certainly tried, but it wasn't to be.
“We've had a frustrating time in terms of losing targets to other clubs, and I'd be very open with that.
“That's happened on several occasions. You just have to accept it. In order for a transfer to really work, in my opinion, the player has to be desperate to come to your club, and if we don't get that, the transfer doesn't work.
“We're seeking players that are good enough, that are desperate to come, and that can make the difference but they're on short supply for us.
“We're confident that we can try and get some more players in to strengthen the depth of the score. We're certainly aware that we need to, and we're trying as hard as we can to do that.
"I'd say I'm hopeful rather than confident because we're not in control of the market or agents, players and other clubs. I can assure everybody we are a hundred per cent on it and trying to do things quickly."
While Newcastle were able to land a top target in Elanga, they have also publicly missed out on Bryan Mbeumo, Matheus Cunha, Liam Delap and Joao Pedro while bids for Hugo Ekitike and James Trafford have been rejected, allowing others to potentially swoop in.
“Yes, we wanted more, I think, from my perspective,” Howe admitted. “When you're going into pre-season, you want your squad together from the first day, and you want to work on everything that you need to work on.
“It's difficult to do that later on in pre-season, because it takes time for our work to feed into the players, but whatever happens, happens, and we have to adapt. So, I'm confident we will try our very, very best to do it.
“I've got no guarantees beyond that, and we're working as hard as we can every day to strengthen the squad.”
When asked why certain transfers have failed to materialise, Howe added: “Yes, I'd say financial, of course, plays a huge part. I think anyone who doesn't think that's true is deluded.
“You know, finance is, I wouldn't say, is the number one for every player. That'd be wrong to put that on each and every player, every situation's different. But we can't, and we aren't, the biggest players in the league because we don't generate the most income.
“So we have to fall in line with PSR and we have to be very smart with what we do. And so we have to control the wages of the players that we have, and that all plays a part in who we can attract.
“The ambition and the work and, trust me, the work that we've put into loads of things that have had no benefit has been there all through the summer. But we still have to do the right things and go through the right processes. And we have to go for the best players that we can.
“We've hit roadblocks on a number of occasions through no fault of our own. So I've been through that many, many times in my career as a manager. And then you just, I look at it very calmly when it happens because, as I said earlier, the players that you sign have to want to come.
“And ultimately, if they don't, they're not the right player for us.”
Newcastle are now set to head to their main pre-season tour in Singapore and South Korea with just one new signing through the door. The Magpies will be hoping to sign a striker, a midfielder, a centre-back and a goalkeeper before the end of the transfer window but that has turned out to be far easier said than done so far.