There is another world, not so very different from this one, in which Newcastle took the pragmatic decision early in the summer that Alexander Isak was leaving, there wasn’t much they could do about it, and they might as well make the best of it: selling players at a profit, after all, is just what clubs on the rise have to do.
That was always true to an extent, but has become especially so in a world governed by profitability and sustainability rules (PSR). They could have taken the £125m, bought players at their leisure, and the sense going into the season would probably have been one of quiet satisfaction at a decent summer.
There has, at least, been an attempt to address some obvious issues in the squad. Callum Wilson was getting old; Yoane Wissa is not only an upgrade but his pace and capacity to pull wide make him a more natural fit for the dynamic counterattacking approach Eddie Howe favours.
Anthony Elanga brings pace and directness on the right and is probably a step up from Jacob Murphy. Jacob Ramsey adds to their creative options. There may be a sense that Malick Thiaw has not quite kicked on as many hoped he would when he first emerged at Schalke but, at 24, he’s a good young defender who adds depth and may yet develop.
The shadow of Isak, though, and more specifically the acrimonious nature of his departure, hangs over everything. Is Nick Woltemade better than Isak? Obviously not. But is Woltemade plus Wissa potentially better in a year or two than Isak plus Wilson? Possibly.
In terms of transfer value, the two pairs roughly cancel (while opening up significant PSR headroom given the nature of amortisation). But because so much emotional energy was invested in keeping Isak, Newcastle’s season has begun in a funk: not great, not terrible, but dominated by three 0-0 draws that have highlighted the absence of a high-class centre-forward.
Even the Carabao Cup triumph has a slight taint now. How can fans settle down to watch a rerun knowing the clinching goal was scored by somebody many would be dismissing as a rat just a few months later?
It is both the blessing and the curse of the big one-club, post-industrial cities of the north that the identification of club and city is so strong. That’s why that victory at Wembley in March stimulated such a feeling of civic pride, but also why Isak provoked such strong reactions: in rejecting Newcastle United, he was also rejecting the city and its people.
What Newcastle are going through now is the equivalent of a painful break-up, reminders of lost love materialising at every turn. That feeling is likely to be particularly acute on Sunday as they face Arsenal, against whom Isak excelled last season. He scored the winner in the league at St James’ Park – a glorious header from Anthony Gordon’s outswinging cross – and then in both legs of the Carabao Cup semi-final.
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Arsenal did beat Newcastle in May, when Isak was absent, but Newcastle’s physicality unsettled them in the first three meetings of the campaign. They also beat Arsenal 1-0 at home the previous season, a series of games that has seemingly contributed to Mikel Arteta’s adoption of an increasingly physical and cautious approach.
Woltemade did score the winner against Wolves and has produced enough nice touches while sporting distinctive facial hair to raise the possibility he could become a cult figure, but – assuming he starts – facing Gabriel Maghalães and William Saliba or Cristhian Mosquera is a whole new level of challenge.
Why, then, given the near-inevitability of Isak’s departure and the futility of keeping a player against his will, and the fact his sale could have been made into a positive, creating PSR headroom for significant spending, did Newcastle wait until the last minute to take the money?
On one level it was simply a failure of leadership. With the sporting director, Paul Mitchell, having left in June, there was a vacuum, nobody to make the decision or to present the board’s position to the public. But perhaps it stung particularly because deep in the folk consciousness of the club is a memory of the 1980s, when Newcastle were forced to sell Chris Waddle, Peter Beardsley and Paul Gascoigne, contributing to the sense of the club as a diminished entity. Isak was not, as those three were, local – but he had been taken to local hearts and become an emblem of a possible future competing with the very best.
There is an echo of the sale of Andy Cole to Manchester United in 1995, the same bewilderment at letting a prolific forward join a Premier League rival, but at least then Kevin Keegan appeared on the steps to explain the decision and there followed a few months later the world-record signing of Alan Shearer. Sir John Hall’s largesse in funding transfers had not stopped. Whether the Saudis remain so committed is less clear.
Ambitious talk of a move to a new stadium in Leazes Park in March seemed a reaffirmation of their commitment, but little has happened since, beyond a petition being raised to save the park. Perhaps there will be progress now David Hopkinson is installed as chief executive, but no decisions are expected until next year at the earliest, in line with the Saudi Public Investment Fund’s (PIF) general policy of retrenchment.
The “strategic realignment” is particularly directed at investments outside Saudi Arabia and, while it may be true that PIF has become frustrated by PSR as a check on the pace of growth, the regulations also serve as useful cover for investors scaling back. As the Swiss Ramble football finance Substack pointed out, a £73m loss from 2021-22 falls out of PSR consideration this year, meaning Newcastle can make a loss of about £80m this financial year and still be compliant.
And that’s the other – ultimately more unsettling – element of the Isak debacle. It’s not just that he will be missed; it’s what he represents. He was the symbol of Newcastle’s imagined future as an elite club with world-class players, a bellwether of the success the Saudi money could bring. Now Isak has gone, and so too has much of optimism about the transformational impact PIF’s investment could have.
