Liverpool have been extremely active in the summer transfer window. The Reds smashed their all-time transfer record to sign Florian Wirtz in a £116m fee from Bayer Leverkusen, while Milos Kerkez and Jeremie Frimpong have also both joined the club.
Despite spending £185m already this summer, the club have shown no signs of slowing down when it comes to transfers. The Reds are eager to sign a striker and Alexander Isak is at the very top of their wishlist.
Liverpool communicated to Newcastle earlier this week that they were keen on signing their star player and were willing to pay around £120m for him. Newcastle don’t have any plans to lose the Swedish international, though, and are hoping to tie him down to a new contract.
Isak Misses Celtic vs Newcastle
The reason why he was absent has emerged
Newcastle were in pre-season action on Saturday afternoon as they travelled to Scotland to face Celtic. Isak was expected to feature but he was a surprise omission from their teamsheet.
It was initially believed that the Magpies were managing his minutes ahead of the new season. Eddie Howe confirmed that was not the case in his post-match press conference, though.
Speaking to the media after the game, Howe revealed that he had sent Isak home amid transfer speculation from Liverpool. Explaining his decision, he said, per the Daily Mail: “I chose to send him home.
“The last thing Alex wants if he is not playing is to be sat in the stand and under that scrutiny, then if he wasn’t going to play today, we mutually agreed he shouldn’t be here.
“It was my decision. He travelled back to Glasgow with us, but I decided to send him home due to the speculation around him. Both [Joelinton and Isak] are fit but not ready to play. Alex has trained and is fine but we didn’t want to take the risk with him.
He added: “Yes, I’ve had discussions with him, but that’s not abnormal. I respect a player’s career and how short it is. Alex has been really good, he’s trained really well and I realise there’ll be noise around him.
“We have a few of those players who are irreplaceable. Your top players are so hard to find, so hard to recruit and so hard to develop. So when you have them, you need to treasure them. Of course we’re desperate to keep him as part of our team. I think it’s difficult for me to ever give 100 per cent clarity on any player, I’d never do that.
“All I can say is Alex is happy at Newcastle, he loves the players, the staff, the team. I’ve never had any issue with him and I’m confident he’s going to be here at the start of the season.”
Liverpool fans have reacted and many have interpreted Howe’s comments to mean Isak is pursuing a move to the club. Discussing on Reddit, one said: “The quotes basically reek of a player who has said he wants to leave but is being told no. Wonder if he hands a transfer request in.”
Another commented: “I think Isak’s head has been turned but don’t think it will amount to anything, Howe’s quotes shouldn’t make Newcastle fans comfortable though.”
A Liverpool fan stated: “Bizarre. He’s basically saying that Isak wants to join us. If he’s happy staying at Newcastle, he’d have been starting and getting up to speed.”
While another wrote: “I don’t particularly care one way or another but the quotes from Howe today are incredibly telling, and I don’t really know why he said any of them. Like all it is actually done is invited a lot more speculation.”