Alexander Isak vs Newcastle United: One of the Craziest Sagas in Recent History | OneFootball

From black and white to red, Alexander Isak’s journey has taken a sharp and bitter turn. Once hailed as the crown jewel of Newcastle United’s new era, the Swedish striker is now seen by many on Tyneside as a traitor. His £130 million switch to Liverpool, a British record, has left fans stunned and divided.

Back in 2022, he arrived as the club’s most expensive signing, a symbol of ambition and hope. By 2025, he’d become a hero. Twenty-seven goals in a single season, Champions League nights under the lights, and that thunderous winner at Wembley to clinch the Carabao Cup against Liverpool. Isak wasn’t just scoring goals; he was making history.

Now, he’s wearing the shirt of the very club he once helped beat. A Geordie icon turned Anfield asset. The fallout? Inevitable.

But this wasn’t just a normal transfer. It was a saga. A long, twisting battle involving agents, missed training sessions, and a player caught between legacy and ambition. Liverpool had been circling for months, maybe even years, but Newcastle were never going to let him go quietly or easily.

How did it reach this point?

Isak was always going to be a headline name once the window opened. Arsenal sounded him out, Liverpool kept watching, and every rumour mill on Tyneside had him front and centre. Liverpool then moved for Hugo Ekitike from Eintracht Frankfurt, which looked like the end of their hunt for a centre forward, only it was not. Inside Anfield, the plan was to add depth, then go big if the right striker became available. The target never changed.

Newcastle’s stance did not waver at first. The response to Liverpool’s initial offer, around £120 million, was immediate: not for sale. Behind the scenes, the mood shifted. Isak missed group sessions and then worked away from the main squad, and that absence became the story. Training plans that were first framed as conditioning soon turned into separation. What had started as a tug of war began to feel like a split.

Eddie Howe tried to keep the temperature down. He talked about standards, about players earning the right to train with the group, and he asked the rest of the squad to park the noise and focus on the next match. It was a manager’s message, calm in tone, firm in meaning. Prepare to play without him until something changes.

Then Isak spoke for himself. In a late statement, he thanked teammates and fans, explained why he skipped a ceremony, and said promises had been made and that trust was lost. He wrote that when trust goes, the relationship cannot continue, and that a change would be best for everyone. It was direct, it was emotional, and it left little room for a quiet climb-down.

From that moment, the path narrowed. Liverpool stayed at the table, Newcastle kept the public line, and the bids crept upward as the clock ran. The gap was never only about money; it was also about a player who felt the bond had broken and a club that did not want to look weak. In the final stretch, the numbers reached a level nobody could really ignore. The deal landed at £130 million, a British record, and the saga finally ended.

So the sequence is simple enough. Liverpool built a cover with Ekitike, then pushed for Isak. Newcastle resisted, the player stepped away, and the conversation moved from tactics to trust. When a striker of that quality is unhappy and a buyer refuses to go away, gravity tends to take over. That is how a Geordie hero became Liverpool’s new number nine, and how a transfer that once looked improbable became inevitable.

Player Discontent and Article 17

After not attending the awards ceremony and the public statement, people began to mention Article 17 of FIFA’s regulations. It is the clause that lets a player terminate a contract without just cause once a certain period has passed, with compensation owed. For players under 28, the protected period is three years.

Isak signed in 2022, which meant he was still inside that protected period. If a player walks during that time, they face a suspension of up to four months. The club they join can also face penalties, and both the player and the new club can be made jointly liable for a very large compensation figure. In short, it is a nuclear button, not a shortcut to a free transfer.

In England, there is another layer. Top Premier League clubs have long treated Article 17 as a bright red line. Unofficially, executives talk about never touching a player who has just torched a contract, because the next time it could be their player on the receiving end. Signing someone who has invoked it would sour boardroom relationships, invite legal counterpunches, and draw the glare of regulators. Even if a club thought the case would stand up, the reputational cost and the risk to future deals would be significant. That is, before you even get to the months of litigation that would follow.

History backs up the caution. The Matuzalem ruling remains the big warning sign. When the Brazilian midfielder walked away from Shakhtar Donetsk to join Real Zaragoza, the matter ended up at CAS. He lost, was hit with a huge compensation award, and the liability was shared with his new club. The numbers were eye-watering, and the fallout dragged on for years. That case reshaped how directors view Article 17. It showed that you can leave, but the bill might be so large that nobody wins.

Lassana Diarra’s saga told a similar story from a different angle. He tried to end his deal with Lokomotiv Moscow and argued he had just cause. He did not convince the panels. What followed was a long spell of limbo, threats of a heavy payment, and a stop-start return to football. By the time he settled, the damage to his career momentum was done. Again, the lesson for players and buyers was plain. This route is slow, expensive, and unpredictable.

So when talk surfaced that Isak could push the Article 17 button, the mood inside the league was pretty blunt. It was mooted, but it never felt likely. He would have risked a suspension right at the start of his new chapter. The buying club would have walked into a legal minefield and a public relations mess. Newcastle would have pursued the maximum compensation and leaned on every precedent available. The Premier League’s informal stance against it would also have cut off his most obvious destinations.

In the end, Article 17 looked more like leverage than a plan. The threat underlines how strained the relationship had become, but the practical barriers were too high. Newcastle kept their public line. Isak pushed for a clean exit. Liverpool stayed patient and worked through the front door. When the fee reached a level that satisfied Newcastle, the whole issue faded away. The move happened the conventional way, which, given the legal and political risks around Article 17, was always the most realistic outcome.

What Happened After The Statement?

Newcastle responded within hours of Isak’s message. The club’s line was short and sharp. He remains under contract and is not available for a transfer. That set the tone, calm in public, uncompromising in substance.

Eddie Howe fronted up next and stuck to the same stance. He said there had been “no change,” repeated that Isak was “our player,” and added that the squad “had to forget about him this weekend” to focus on the match in front of them. He also returned to a theme he has used before: players have to “earn the right to train with the group.”

Behind the scenes, the football decision matched the words. Isak was told to work away from the first-team group; he was left out of matchday preparation, and selections moved on without him. What had been a dispute on a phone screen became a practical separation at Darsley Park.

The supporter reaction was immediate and noisy. Some fans called the statement a betrayal, others argued the fee should be maximised and reinvested, and a fair few just wanted the saga off the front page so the team could settle. Matchday conversations on Barrack Road were blunt. Nobody is bigger than the shirt. Get on with it.

Alan Shearer spoke for a big chunk of Tyneside. He praised what Isak had delivered in black and white, then criticised the idea of refusing to play. In his view, once you sign a contract, you honour it, and the standards inside a dressing room matter more than any single name on the back of a shirt.

Ownership kept the message tight. Publicly, Newcastle repeated that Isak was going nowhere. Privately, the stance was valuation and control; only a truly exceptional offer would be entertained and only on the club’s terms. That line held while the coaching staff planned without him and while the recruitment team modelled how a large sale might be turned into two or three additions.

Liverpool stayed patient. Their recruitment team monitored every twist, prepared the numbers, and waited to see if Newcastle’s posture would soften under the weight of a record bid. The longer the stand-off ran, the clearer it became that the situation was heading for a binary finish, a full reintegration with bridges rebuilt, or an exit at a level that made football and financial sense to Newcastle.

In the end, the path was set by those first 48 hours after the statement. The club reasserted control, the manager parked the noise, the player trained apart, and the fanbase hardened around the team. Once the offer reached the threshold, the deal moved quickly. What started as a social post after an awards night became the spark for the final act of a record transfer.

Alexander Isak Signs for Liverpool

As the final 24 hours of the summer window approached, the two clubs struck a record-breaking £130 million deal for Alexander Isak, making him the most expensive signing in British football history. Both sets of fans breathed a sigh of relief: Liverpool fans were delighted to finally welcome the striker aboard, while Newcastle fans were happy to secure the money and see the back of Isak.

Newcastle only used 37 words to announce Alexander Isak’s departure.

The impact this saga has had on the toons is clear as day, Winless in all 3 of their Premier League fixtures so far, with performances that have failed to impress.

The fallout from the saga has clearly bled into Newcastle’s start: winless across their first three Premier League matches and performances short on conviction. The mood lifted with a win over Wolves, debutant Nick Woltemade marking his arrival with a goal, proof there may be life after Isak. Even so, that sluggish opening leaves them playing catch-up; only a sustained run will quieten the noise.Liverpool, on the other hand, has enjoyed a spectacular start to the season, with 4 wins in 4 for Slot’s men. Their momentum was highlighted away at Newcastle, when they came out on top in a 5-goal thriller to win what many dubbed the “Alexander Isak” derby.

For now, Isak still hasn’t started, and it may be some time before we see him at full tilt. Fitness, rhythm, and trust will all need rebuilding before the goals flow as they once did. What’s certain is that the saga won’t fade quickly; its aftershocks will linger in the stands and the boardroom alike, shaping how both player and club are judged in the weeks ahead. A rivalry has been created.