Dan Burn has delivered his verdict on “quality” Newcastle United signing Sven Botman.
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Last month, Newcastle finally brought an end to a protracted transfer saga and sealed Botman’s signing in a £30m deal from Lille.
The 22-year-old had been a target during the January transfer window and was once again top of Eddie Howe’s wish-list heading into the summer. Despite intense competition from AC Milan, the club managed to pull off what is seen as a coup and bring the highly-rated Dutchman to St James’ Park.
Botman is the second centre-back Newcastle have signed in as many windows following Burn’s £13m arrival from Brighton in January.
Previously, the club had not strengthened in that department since the signing of Federico Fernandez in 2019, but that area of the squad now looks strong. Fabian Schar’s revival under Howe has seen him rewarded with a new deal, while Jamaal Lascelles and even Paul Dummett provide other options.
What did Burn say about Botman?
“Looks really good,” said Burn to the club’s in-house media channel while away in Austria.
“Obviously he’s very young, I can’t believe the size of him for his age, I was even skinnier back then!
We’ve taken a look at the stats behind our third summer signing, Sven Botman from the 2021-22 season.#NUFC @ACToolsUK pic.twitter.com/WwHD58b9eL
— Newcastle United StatZone (@nufcsz) July 11, 2022
“He’s shown his quality. I haven’t seen him play in a game yet but it’ll be good to get some more minutes with him.”
With both Burn and Botman being predominantly left-footed, the 30-year-old was asked about a potential battle between the two for a starting berth.
“Yeah it’s good,” Burn added when asked of the competition.
“I think you saw in January, the lads who came in – myself included – it’s just competition for places.
“I think that when you know you’re playing week in, week out you can sort of relax a little but, as I said, it’s a competition.”
When is Newcastle’s next game?
The pre-season training camp will ramp up on Friday when Howe’s side take on Bundesliga outfit 1860 Munich at 1.30pm BST.
Over the weekend, Newcastle beat Gateshead 5-1.
