https://theathletic.com/3731981/2022/10/27/newcastle-money-klopp/Newcastle United are rich but recent success is down to more than just money
By George Caulkin
Oct 26, 2022
The surprising thing about Jurgen Klopp and his recent prodding of Newcastle United as one of three clubs “who can do what they want financially” is less about what he said than when he said it. The best teams tend to have the deepest pockets and, however difficult it remains to get your head around the concept after a long decade of stunted ambition and limited spending, this is the territory clearly marked out at St James’ Park.
“There is no ceiling for Newcastle. Congratulations, but some other clubs have ceilings,” said Klopp and, in a few years, the Liverpool manager may well be right. The plan is to be regulars in Europe, to be competing and winning things and with the financial clout of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, their 80 per cent owners, behind them, Newcastle have both the will and resources to make it happen.
In that sense, fair game and fair enough. Newcastle supporters may as well get used to it, just as fans of Manchester City and Paris Saint-Germain, the other members of Klopp’s high-rolling axis of affluence, have done. Buying success and the inference that it tramples over skill and nuance is a well-established accusation and it is only heightened in an era of ownership that includes sovereign wealth funds. Most of the time, money wins.
And who can argue with the basic contention that Newcastle have splurged on new players since their takeover was ratified 12 months ago? The £90-odd million they committed in January was more than any other club in the world. Threatened with relegation, they stayed up and then went for it again in the summer, smashing their transfer record with the £60million purchase of Alexander Isak, which takes their total outlay to a mind-bending £200million ($232m).
So here they are, fourth in the table, fresh from facing Tottenham Hotspur on their own turf and deservedly winning, putting down a marker and gatecrashing a Champions League place, surging upwards with no ceiling after doing what they wanted, more or less. Newcastle may be a considerable distance ahead of their own schedule, but they have barged their way up the Premier League in their diamond-encrusted bulldozer.
Except that watching the Spurs match on a pub telly with a mate, who isn’t massively into football, and trying (and failing) to explain how seeing Newcastle participate in an engaging, front-foot contest between two decent sides is still so completely alien, reinforced the thought that Klopp could hardly have been more wrong. From this point, cash will always be associated with Newcastle’s story, but it is a long way from being the only story.
In any case, everything has a context, money included. In the two transfer windows before the takeover, Newcastle only signed players called Joe Willock. The core of their squad was unchanged since promotion in 2017 and those players aged and lost value. Selling to buy has not been an option because they had almost nothing to sell. Investment was necessary because it followed underinvestment. Partially, it was a correction. Partially, there was no alternative.
The truly remarkable part about that 2-1 victory over Tottenham and a performance Eddie Howe rated as “probably the best” of his spell at the club was not just how different Newcastle have become in terms of quality and outlook, it was how much they remain the same. Six members of the starting team — more than half of it, in other words — pre-date the head coach’s arrival and pre-date the flood of money.
“Playing like (Miguel) Almiron”, that well-lubricated jibe from Jack Grealish, now means scoring more goals than Gabriel Jesus and Mohamed Salah this season. Fabian Schar, who cost £3million, is crucial to the Premier League’s tightest defence. Joelinton surely represents the greatest about-turn in form and fortune in Newcastle’s history. Sean Longstaff is again the dynamic midfielder who came to the fore under Rafa Benitez. Willock is box-to-box energy.
The exception is Callum Wilson who, when fit, has always been vital (and good), but there have been times when the others have either looked like lost boys, been discarded or a combination of the two, and so for Newcastle to be where they are and for these players to be prominent is testament both to their own resilience and Howe and his coaching staff. As an achievement, it is up there with their dash to safety last spring. Exceptional.
It is also worth digging into the money a little bit. Dan Burn played at left-back against Tottenham. If memory serves, there wasn’t frenzied competition from other clubs when Newcastle brought him home in January from Brighton & Hove Albion, where he wasn’t guaranteed a game. Nick Pope, brilliant in goal, joined them from relegated Burnley in the summer, for an initial payment of just £3million. Couldn’t anybody have afforded that?
Kieran Trippier has been a transformative signing, an England international last seen winning La Liga with Atletico Madrid, but Newcastle didn’t get him by blowing their rivals out of the water or shattering their wage bill. They did their homework, heard he might be receptive to coming back to the Premier League and quietly made their move when others didn’t. There was no get-out clause in his contract if the team had been relegated.
The same applies to Bruno Guimaraes, their Brazilian playmaker who, along with Sven Botman, showcases the kind of team Newcastle want to become: talented, with their best years ahead of them and no limit on their potential. That version of the future is exciting, but it is not accurate to suggest that the club simply threw their corporate credit card at them. They were smart signings bought for decent prices who, as things stand, are climbing in value.
Chris Wood is the opposite. Would any other club have triggered his £25million release clause at Burnley? Doubtful, but it was also born from pragmatism. With Wilson injured, Newcastle required a ready-made centre-forward and although he is nobody’s idea of the future, the New Zealand international played his part in survival. Isak’s fee is even heftier, but he came at another moment of doubt for Wilson. Newcastle switched targets and acted.
There were some pointed remarks when Aston Villa appointed Steven Gerrard a couple of days after Howe tipped up in Newcastle. Comparisons are not always useful, but the divergence between the clubs is interesting if nothing else; there has been no big name like Philippe Coutinho at St James’, where character was the first building block Howe put in place. Now Gerrard has gone, replaced by Unai Emery, who turned down the Newcastle job before Howe took it.
The law of averages tells you that Newcastle will eventually sign a dud because their hit rate is unsustainable, however meticulous their background checks are. The rules of progress suggest they will have to take a few risks on players, that salaries will go up and that as they get better they will move away from the cadre who have carried them here. The challenge for Howe then will be to protect the ethos that came with them, but to date they have been measured, cautious and intelligent.
Howe was well within his rights to have a nibble back at Klopp, even without naming him, because in lots of ways, Newcastle are starting from scratch. Their training ground is being modernised — and not before time, given the “embarrassing” facility the new owners inherited.
What about commercial and marketing, that other great driver of footballing revenue? When Darren Eales started work as chief executive in August, it was with a staff of four. The biggest clubs employ 250 people. Newcastle might get there, but for now they are miles off.
There may not be “a ceiling” in terms of their ambition, but they are absolutely hampered by their infrastructure, staffing levels and by financial fair play and even if you accept what he was getting at, Klopp might have acknowledged the superb job Howe has done and is doing.
Newcastle’s 12th league game last season was Howe’s first at the club. A 3-3 draw with Brentford — in which Schar, Willock, Joelinton and Wilson all started — saw them drop to bottom of the table. After 12 games this time… well, just look at them.
Howe said he felt obliged “to stand up for my football club”, which is absolutely fair enough, because nobody else will. On the pitch, it is already becoming a theme; after years of sitting back and soaking up punches, of damage limitation or harrowing defeats, Newcastle have drawn with Manchester City and Manchester United this season, lost in the final seconds at Liverpool and they have now won at Spurs. They have a backbone and an identity.
But the real pleasure of watching Newcastle at the moment is sort of the opposite to what Klopp meant. In his telling, doing “what they want” sounds like the blunderbuss of a blank cheque, obliterating everything, when on Tyneside what they have sought is the minutiae of improvement on the training pitch and building on what they had. Doing what they want is apparent in every Joelinton tackle and every Almiron smile.
They are richer, yes. But so much better.