OPINION
Whenever a player excels for a mid-to-lower Premier League team like Newcastle United, the club’s supporters will always begin to fear his departure.
That is the situation facing Magpies fans in regards to Ayoze Perez at the moment, who has burst into life in recent weeks, scoring five goals in his last four games.
The phenomenal run the Spaniard is on has many prognosticators predicting his exit in the near future, including BBC pundit Noel Whelan.
“I think once you get into double figures from that kind of area on the field then yeah,” he told Football Insider when asked whether Perez could be off this summer.
That kind of verdict will have the Toon Army sweating buckets, there’s no doubt about that. The 25-year-old has been exceptional of late and there will doubtless be plenty of teams in England and back in Spain admiring his current run of form.
For Newcastle, though, it is absolutely crucial that they keep him around for the foreseeable future, although the length of Perez’s stay at the club is likely intrinsically linked to that of manager Rafael Benitez. If the former Liverpool boss leaves, then his countryman could well follow him out of the St James’ Park exit door.
That’s a frightening thought for the Magpies faithful, but it’s certainly a realistic proposition at this moment in time. Whelan certainly sees Perez’s departure as a legitimate possibility, anyway.
Perez knows how beloved he is on Tyneside, but he will probably want to see the club display a bit more ambition before he commits himself to stay long-term.
Until he does that, though, people like Whelan will continue to speculate that he could soon be off – and nobody in Newcastle wants that.
