Alan Pardew always expected other clubs to, if you will, act like Magpies the moment Newcastle United expressed an interest in a French player
Alan Pardew always expected other clubs to, if you will, act like Magpies the moment Newcastle United expressed an interest in a French player.
If Newcastle bid for any Ligue 1 player, so the theory goes, then not only would he be a decent footballer, but is also going to be worth the money spent on them.
What Pardew meant, and this is something he's said more than once, was that he expected any attempted hijack of a potential transfer to be conducted by a Premier League club.
Paris St Germain, however, have become game-changers since being taken over by their Qatari owners in the summer of 2011, and their power and money could be about to come knocking on the door of St James' Park.
This tactic of their director of football, former Brazil star Leonardo, of publicly suggesting a potential move for another club's player is not the done thing, but then being obnoxious is something the uber-rich have always been good at, along with spending money.
Hatem Ben Arfa is another who has been linked by the Paris-based media this season with a move to the club he supported as a boy, which prompted the Newcastle star to admit going there would be "a dream come true."
But then came the Qatar Sport Investment, who are run by the oil-rich state's government, who bought PSG. So basically an entire country, and one that's GDP is $100bn, owns the football club.
David Beckham's recent arrival in Paris may have had little to do with football, but the signing of Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Thiago Silva, Lucas Moura, Ezequiel Lavezzi and Javier Pastore, for a combined fee of more than £200m, was a statement of intent.
Unlike the Manchester City support who have welcomed their own foreign owners, they do not want to see their club drift away from their French identity. This is why the owners have claimed, and it remains to be seen whether they will follow this through, that French players are their priority from now.
Chief scout Graham Carr will continue to use his contacts in France, a tactic that has worked quite brilliantly, but his is a more difficult job now.
PSG won't be interested in the like of Yoan Gouffran or Massadio Haidara, as they want the finished article, but buying the likes of Moussa Sissoko and Mapou Yanga- Mbiwa, established French-based players who arrived in January, might not be as straightforward from now on.
Qatar did not just buy a football club two years ago. They hope to have bought a positive imagine with an eye on the World Cup 2022 that is to be held in the desert country.
And just like building 12 new football stadiums in the sand for a four- week, one-off tournament, the PSG owners do not care if their Paris project is not sustainable.
It's not that Newcastle would not be able to compete with finding the next Cabaye, or keeping the one they already have, it's that nobody can.
Via: [Live Football] Al - Wasl - Al - Shabab - UAE Football League
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