If the latest claims around Newcastle United and Marc Guehi are true then the game has gone mad

Newcastle United tried and tried to land Marc Guehi from Crystal Palace in the summer increasing their initial bid by £25 million and still seeing it be rejected.

The Magpies started out with a reported £55 million bid for the England centre-back going up to an eventual bid of around £70 million before the club realised there was no deal to be made.

£70 million would have made Marc Guehi the club's most expensive signing, eclipsing the previous record of £63 million which the club forked over to Real Sociedad for Alexander Isak.

That was crazy enough to contemplate for a defender, but now TeamTalk are suggesting that Newcastle could go in with a bigger bid in January.

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Newcastle are preparing an £80 million bid for Marc Guehi

TeamTalk claims that Newcastle are preparing an eye-watering £80 million bid for the 24-year-old who hasn't really had the start to the season that would justify the initial £55 million bid if we're being honest.

We have absolutely no faith in this story, however, as it hasn't even been determined if Newcastle still even hold an interest in Guehi, or at least dealing with Crystal Palace after their games over the summer.

More importantly, though, Guehi's contract is running down and Palace will be aware that in each window his value will take a hit because of it, so surely, even Steve Parish can see that they won't get the same amount they were hoping for in the summer, even with 18 months left on his deal.

The fees quoted for Marc Guehi were always on the high side

We think Newcastle got it about right with their initial bid for Guehi, but then you have to add on the Newcastle tax and the England international tax too, and maybe, just maybe we could get to £65 million. We'd be getting ripped off, for sure, but we could at least see the working.

£80 million for a defender is insanity. We know it has been done before, but it was mental then and it's still mental now.

Word is that Guehi wants the move to Liverpool anyway, so let them get fleeced and we can find another top quality defender on the continent like we did with Sven Botman.