Report: Agreement in place as key Newcastle United man looks to be on his way out

As Newcastle United fans we already have a pretty strong dislike of Manchester United, but that's about to become even deeper.

We've had a feeling for a while that Dan Ashworth would down tools at Newcastle and head to Manchester United if the 20% buy-in to the club by his mate Sir Jim Ratcliffe went ahead.

Today that transaction was approved and immediately, the ground beneath Dan Ashworth at Newcastle started to look very shaky.

Man United are preparing a formal approach for Dan Ashworth

Now Craig Hope of The Daily Mail has revealed the news we were all expecting and that's that the deal to take Dan Ashworth to Old Trafford could be done sooner rather than later.

Man United haven't made a formal approach just yet but they are working on it and Hope expects that everything will be ironed out as early as next week.

Ashworth is the central cog in the big wheel that is the PIF's project at Newcastle United and replacing him will not be easy, especially as Ashworth is widely regarded as one of, if not the best in the business.

The PIF plan leapt ahead of schedule when Eddie Howe guided Newcastle to a cup final and a Champions League place in his first full season in charge, but this season things have levelled out to around where it's believed we should be.

That's been in part due to many, many injuries, but also because of the recruitment choices made in the summer with many fans laying the blame for the lack of due diligence done on Sandro Tonali squarely at Dan Ashworth's feet. We don't agree with that sentiment at all, but we're going to hang on to it now if Ashworth bails on us and goes to that horrible club.

Ashworth hasn't been given the control he was promised at Newcastle

The Daily Mail claims that Ashworth feels he hasn't had as much control as he was expecting at Newcastle, and to be honest, it does feel like a lot of things are done without his involvement.

We do still hope Ashworth is a man of integrity and will stick to his word when he's said that he's happy and committed to the Newcastle project, especially because we don't want some young gun from Bournemouth to come in to replace him. We've got enough Bournemouth in our Newcastle, thanks.

However, if he's not being given the control he was promised when he joined the club, we can't really blame him if someone else comes along and offers him more money and more control. We will just have to see how it all pans out in the coming days.