Newcastle United are set to announce the appointment of Steve Bruce as their next manager within the next 48 hours barring any late hitches, according to the Telegraph.
The newspaper claims that Bruce, 58, will be confirmed as the new Magpies boss before the weekend as long as there are any last-minute hurdles put in the way of a deal.
However it is understood that the ex-Sunderland manager might not be able to travel to China on the club’s pre-season tour on Saturday due to visa issues.
The Telegraph reports that if Bruce does agree personal terms with Newcastle, then the Tyneside club will try their hardest to ensure that the boyhood Geordie can travel to the Far East.
OPINION
Although Bruce has been reportedly on the radar of Newcastle ever since Rafa Benitez left, the Magpies have closed in on the Sheffield Wednesday manager at a rate of knots over the last 24 hours and they now seem very close to completing a deal. It’s not an appointment that will go down well with the Toon Army though. Bruce has done well at Sheffield Wednesday but he’s never really gone above and beyond in any of his roles in the Premier League. He’s always managed teams that are languishing at the bottom end of the table and he’s not someone who’s immune to suffering relegation like some other managers who’d be classed similar to him. Bruce is a former Sunderland manager, but that is not the main issue with appointing him, it’s the fact that he hasn’t done anything in his career to prove that he’s good enough for this job. Look at his work at Aston Villa. They were a mid-table Championship team with him but Dean Smith took over and won promotion.
