According to transfer expert Fabrizio Romano, Newcastle United have rejected a verbal bid from Juventus for centre-back Lloyd Kelly.
The Magpies’ unbeaten run in all competitions came to an end after eight weeks on Tyneside yesterday when Bournemouth took all three points from their visit to St James’ Park.
Eddie Howe’s men looked a shadow of themselves in the 4-1 defeat, with only on-field captain Bruno Guimaraes sparing them from complete humiliation in front of the home support with a well-placed header.
Indeed, it won’t be all doom and gloom for the North East giants who remain inside the top four this weekend with Chelsea yet to play their Premier League fixture and will be hoping Wolverhampton Wanderers can take something from Stamford Bridge.
In terms of the January transfer window, as expected it has been a quiet month so far on Tyneside with Howe making it clear that selling players would be the likely route to bringing in some new additions before the market closes until the summer.
Miguel Almiron and Martin Dubravka have both been strongly linked with moves away from the club this January, and an offer of £11m being tabled for the Paraguayan forward this week, but neither he nor the Slovakian goalkeeper is yet to commit to an exit.
One player who has gone under the radar this month is Lloyd Kelly, the centre-back whom Newcastle signed on a free transfer just last summer, however, interest in snatching his services has been intensifying over the last few days.
Italian transfer expert Fabrizio Romano has taken to X today to confirm that Juventus have had an initial verbal bid rejected for Kelly by Newcastle, but are not giving up yet.
Romano tweeted:
“Juventus have asked for Lloyd Kelly as new centre back with verbal bid rejected by Newcastle for loan with buy option clause.”
“Juventus remain interested after #NUFC rejected €13m proposal from Fenerbahçe this week; Juve now hope to advance for fee around €15m [£13m]. Deal on.”
Should Newcastle sell Lloyd Kelly?
There is no doubt, given Newcastle’s financial concerns, that the temptation to sell Kelly for pure profit would be high, but there is the risk that there won’t be enough quality in the defensive set up to see out the second half of the season.
The Magpies are still in the FA Cup, are one game away from going to Wembley for the Carabao Cup final and competing in a tight race to qualify for European football ahead of next season, so there is a lot at stake at this stage of the campaign.
Having said that, Sven Botman has returned to full fitness after suffering an ACL injury that saw him sidelined for eight months and Dan Burn is also highly experienced in the left-sided role of the centre-back partnership, and like Kelly, can play left-back too.
The 26-year-old – once dubbed a “Rolls-Royce” by Jonathan Woodgate – has only tallied up nine league appearances in his short stint on Tyneside, so with his game time so limited it wouldn’t be surprising if the defender is interested in moving on.
It’s not an ideal situation to lose depth in such an important area of the squad, but the club may feel their hands are tied if they can command a worthy fee for Kelly in the remaining weeks of the window.
With that being said, it will be interesting to see how this potential deal progresses and whether it will prompt some incoming activity for the club before the transfer market closes again in just under two weeks.
