Liverpool and Newcastle United contract situations bear close inspection | OneFootball

Something caught my eye about Liverpool and I couldn’t help compare it to Newcastle United.

I reckon it is fair to say that the media see the running of both clubs very differently.

One a smooth running well-oiled machine, one oil-owned and a bit of a joke.

I don’t think I need to tell you which is which, in the media’s eyes.

When I saw this latest particular Liverpool mention though, it made me wonder.

It appears not everything at Anfield might be all that smooth running after all, the ultra professional look slipping.

Three of the best Liverpool players, arguably the club’s three best and top stars, only have nine months remaining on their contracts.

How those in charge at Liverpool have allowed things to get to this stage surely bears close scrutiny.

PSG messed up big time in allowing Kylian Mbappe to take the proverbial, instead of biting the bullet and selling him before things went too far, they allowed him to enter the final year of his contract and left for nothing, meaning he could demand an even bigger ransom from Real Madrid in terms of wages and signing on fee.

Now it is rumoured that Real Madrid are set to do the same with a certain Trent Alexander-Arnold.

Liverpool having allowed the 25 year old to now be only nine month months away from walking away for nothing. With the England international refusing to sign a new contract, how have the scousers let it reach this point?

Turns out that Liverpool have also managed to get to the same point with Mo Salah and Virgil Van Dijk.

I know that these are two older players than the Alexander-Arnold situation but these are two stellar players who are still arguably Liverpool’s best two players, three if you include the other one refusing to sign a new contract.

By the end of the season, Salah and Van Dijk will still only be 32 and 33 respectively and both look just as important for Liverpool now.

The fact they are still first choice for the scousers is proof of that, plus if say Liverpool had chosen to sell either of them in the summer, you would still have been talking tens of millions. As for Trent Alexander-Arnold, who knows what he would have fetched in the summer transfer window?

What about those bungling amateurs at St James’ Park then, how do they compare with their Liverpool counterparts, when it comes to professionally running a Premier League club?

How the Newcastle United contracts situation currently looks, when current deals end – 14 September 2024:

End of June 2025:

Dubravka, Schar, Wilson, Burn, Lascelles, Krafth, Gillespie, Ruddy, Lewis

End of June 2026:

Targett, Pope, Almiron, Longstaff, Ashby, Hayden, Trippier

End of June 2027:

Botman, Jacob Murphy, Willock

End of June 2028:

Tonali, Gordon, Isak, Barnes, Livramento, Bruno, Miley, Joelinton, Alex Murphy

End of June 2029:

Kelly, Hall

To get the Newcastle United contracts situation into such a healthy position, is outstanding work.

During this most recent (2023/24) season, both Bruno Guimaraes and Joelinton were persuaded to sign big new contracts. I hesitate to say it, but… they are almost like new signings! That is, in terms of how much better a position it put the club in with both of them.

They really were game changers, our boys from Brazil both now contracted until end of January 2028.

Without those new agreements, Newcastle United would now have Joelinton with less than one year left on his contract and Bruno with less than two years.

Stop for a moment and just think how uncomfortably we would all be sitting now!

All of Newcastle United’s key players have at least just three years left on their contracts, in most cases it is a minimum of at least just under four years.

All in all, a massively healthy Newcastle United contracts position, something which has been worked on and credit to those who have made it happen.

Yes, we do have some Newcastle United players with less than a year remaining on their Newcastle United contracts, the likes of Lascelles, Schar, Wilson and Burn.

All four are in their 30s though and if everyone fit, then out of the quartet only Schar would be in the first team, not even him if United had signed Marc Guehi.

Fair to say as well I think, that none of these four are going to choose to leave Newcastle United, especially Dan Burn, who waited so long to get his chance at the club he has always supported.

As for transfer fees, if any of the four had left this past summer, none of them would have brought in anything remotely close to say what Salah or Van Dijk would have generated, never mind Alexander-Arnold. It doesn’t mean those NUFC players aren’t good players, it is just reality what the value of them is in the eyes of other clubs.

With a lot of talk claiming both Isak and Gordon could well be agreeing even longer contract extensions beyond their current 2028 deals, you have to hand it to Newcastle United that they are managing this key area of operations so well.