Report: Jamaal Lascelles to leave Newcastle with Turkish giants interested in the NUFC captain

While Newcastle United fans are focused on potential incomings to help out with the injury crisis, there's also the matter of outgoings to deal with.

The Daily Mail are reporting that Turkish side Besiktas are interested in Newcastle's Jamaal Lascelles, although the report fails to mention whether this would be a January move or whether they'll wait until summer.

Letting Lascelles leave in January simply doesn't make sense. He's played a huge part this season when covering for Sven Botman, and the way our squad is dropping like flies, we can't really afford to let anyone go until this season is wrapped up.

This could be Lascelles' last season at Newcastle

It's fair to say that the club captain probably doesn't have much of a future at the club beyond this campaign however.

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Indeed, Lascelles has shown this season that he's still got what it takes to play at the top level, he's still a way off the level we need to be at. He's not a patch on Sven Botman for example.

Newcastle will be looking to add another centre-back of Botman's quality and youth in the near future, but until that player or players come through the door, Jamaal Lascelles is not expendable.

How times change

That's a far cry from what I was saying about a year ago when I would have carried Lascelles out of the club on my back as I deemed him surplus to requirements, but the former Nottingham Forest man has proved me wrong this year.

We'll just have to wait and see whether Besiktas come forward with a bid, but if it's this month I definitely expect it to be rejected unless there's a player coming in to replace him straight away.

If that player is Fikayo Tomori who was linked yesterday, then that would just be spiffing, highly unlikely, especially given the source, but spiffing.