Newcastle United keen to avoid Alexander Isak 2.0 with Sandro Tonali after Arsenal chaos
Newcastle United transfers: Sandro Tonali was caught up in a deadline day transfer story with Arsenal that got alarm bells ringing back on Tyneside.
Sandro Tonali’s long-term future at Newcastle United was cast into further doubt on transfer deadline day when a story emerged linking the Italian with a move to Arsenal.
Ultimately, the move never materialised and was realistically never going to so late in the window. But that only makes the claims the Italian was offered to Arsenal all the more concerning from a Newcastle perspective.
All it achieved was causing chaos on deadline day and fuelling speculation ahead of the summer window.
Sandro Tonali deadline day chaos
While Tonali’s agent, Giuseppe Riso, shut down the story as ‘nonsense’ and claimed no conversations took place, The Athletic’s David Ornstein doubled down on his claim that one of Tonali’s representatives made contact with Arsenal regarding the Newcastle star.
“[It was] a complicated one,” Ornstein told Sky Sports. “Unless you're fully on the inside, you don't know the exact ins and outs of it all. Arsenal have had an admiration of Tonali for a long time, dating back years. A few of us had reported on it.
“We established across the course of the day that there were absolutely no talks between Newcastle and Arsenal. No club-to-club contact at all.
“But a representative of Sandro Tonali, and there is some conjecture about how many people represent him, reached out to Arsenal and their sporting director Andrea Berta and offered the player to the club. And for Berta, it's his job to explore these situations and look into viability with the agent. And it became clear very quickly that there was no viability.
“Newcastle had no intention of opening any doors to Tonali leaving either now or in the future. If they did, the price would be way too high for Arsenal's capabilities at this moment in time.
“Complete perplexion at Newcastle. They had no talks, no contact, no communication and no intent of letting him go. I don't think it was ever on to be off.”
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Eddie Howe responds to Sandro Tonali Arsenal links
When asked about the deadline day story, Howe said: “No, certainly there was no intention from our side to lose Sandro at all.
“I think he's such an integral player to what we're doing. I think he's very happy here. He loves playing for Newcastle and loves representing the city.
“Sandro's absolutely fine. I had discussions with Sandro yesterday. He's absolutely focused on the here, the now, playing for us.
“His only focus, talking to him yesterday, was Manchester City and trying to win that game. So, there's absolutely no issue with Sandro himself, and he's very happy and he's committed.
“So, I find it difficult to talk about things that I don't know too much about.
“I can only talk about Sandro as the person and the player and his sort of mindset here and now, having discussed things with him yesterday. He's absolutely fine.”
NUFC keen to avoid an Alexander Isak 2.0
Newcastle will naturally be wary of the situation after losing a top talent in Alexander Isak last summer after a season of transfer speculation.
The Magpies were initially confident they could keep hold of the Swedish striker. But once it became clear that was not going to be possible, the club agreed a £130million Premier League record transfer with Liverpool on deadline day.
But Howe doesn’t believe a similar situation will play out with Tonali this year.
“I don't think so, but lots of things happen without my knowledge,” Howe said when asked if he was worried about a repeat of what unfolded with Isak last year. “As far as I'm aware, we've got a player that's an outstanding footballer, an outstanding person. He's very happy here.
“He's got a great relationship with me, his teammates. Seems really, really happy within himself. So that would surprise me.
“But I think he's always going to be attracting, or our best players will always be attracting glances from other clubs. That's just the reality of football. We want to keep the group together.
“We want to keep being progressive. And, of course, Sandro plays a part in that, trying to hit his best levels and play as well as he can to help the team. So, all encompassed, I don't see an issue.
“But, as I say, I'm not in control of everything.”
Newcastle felt they could resolve the Isak situation last summer, perhaps naively so. But without a sporting director in place and the club caught up in the biggest transfer saga of the summer, their summer business and start of the season suffered as they had no proven striker in place.
And Howe admitted the club has learned lessons from how the Isak situation was handled as it looks to avoid a repeat in the future.
“Probably a lot [learned],” Howe said. “But, you know, stuff that's above me, I think. Obviously, in the summer, we didn't have a sporting director which massively impacted our way of working in terms of dealing with agents and dealing with that situation. We were in a more vulnerable position than we are now.
“Obviously, Ross [Wilson] has filled that position and showing really good leadership, dealing with transfers and all the things that that entails. So, I think we're in a stronger position now to navigate those waters in a much calmer, clearer way.”