Sir Jim Ratcliffe asks for face-to-face with Amanda Staveley to resolve the Dan Ashworth dispute

The Dan Ashworth-Newcastle United-Manchester United Saga is starting to drag on more than the ending of the third Lord of the Rings movie now.

Newcastle's former sporting director remains on gardening leave while Newcastle and Man United's representatives stare each other down waiting for the other to blink.

The Magpies are demanding £20million compensation to release Ashworth from his contract early so that he can join Manchester United's board, but the Red Devils are refusing to cough up so much money for a board member.

CEO Darren Eales has been leading the negotiations from Newcastle's side while Jim Ratcliffe has had his own representatives deal with it from his side, but it seems that the INEOS chief has finally had enough.

Getty Images

Ratcliffe is getting his hands dirty himself

The Times have reported that Jim Ratcliffe has gone to Amanda Staveley to try and thrash out a deal.

Man United want Ashworth in place before the next season gets underway, but ideally would like him in for the summer to help with transfers.

The rest of the board at Old Trafford is taking shape, but Ashworth remains the outlier and Ratcliffe's revolution is having to move on without him.

Keep on dragging it out for our amusement

There's no indication of how the talks went, but we can't imagine that Wor Mandy would have budged. She didn't earn her reputation by being a pushover in negotiations.

I've personally never been so amused by something so dull as a contract negotiation, but the longer it drags on the funnier it gets.

I bet Ashworth's garden is looking mint by now. That's all he's allowed to do on gardening leave, right? I mean, the clue's in the name.