Newcastle move for (another) French midfielder.

Newcastle are set to launch a bid for Saint-Eteinne midfielder Blaise Matuidi, if reports on The Journal are to be believed.

The Journal also 'understands' that Newcastle are set to bid for Switzerland midfielder Tranquillo Barnetta and are on the verge of concluding deals for West Ham's Demba Ba and Swansea City left-back Neil Taylor and claim that the pair will be announced by Newcastle by the end of the week. Another Friday announcement perhaps?

We'll see on that.

As I said in the last article, NUFC must now show some transfer intent to allay growing concerns amongst the Toon faithful. The loss of Nolan will only be countered by real action in the transfer market, but even then it's no guarantee that a player will work out, as we well know.

So what about the two bits of speculation? Well we covered Tranquillo Barnetta yesterday briefly, but what about the other one? I wouldn't want to be all blasé about Blaise Matuidi, so let's take a look at him.

The instant comparison is Cheik Tiote. They are very similar types of player and are a similar age to start with, and they both have a habit of picking up yellow cards. Of course now I've mentioned that people will start to worry about the future of Tiote. Rightly or wrongly? Hmm.

Matuidi currently plays for Saint-Etienne and has made 132 appearances for the club. He has been watched by Arsenal on numerous occasions and has been linked with a move to them for some time which, for whatever reason, has never materialised.

He is a player that would come only for first-team football, which will either cast doubts over the future of Cheik Tiote or signal a change in formation and how we play the game. One thing is for sure, if it is the latter and we end up a defensive central midfield pairing of Tiote and Matuidi I wouldn't fancy playing against them. They wouldn't give much change, put it that way.

We'll see what happens of course as nothing is guaranteed. I'd like to hope that the club are going to pull something out the bag, but I understand that we don't exactly have a fantastic history of that. Still, I am the eternal optimist!

Or as mad as a march hare. You decide :mrgreen: