Eddie Howe offers update on Sandro Tonali's Newcastle future from Barcelona

Eddie Howe has spoken to the media ahead of Newcastle United's Champions League Round of 16 second leg tie with Barcelona tomorrow. Kick-off is 5:45pm, live on TNT Sports.

Newcastle will be seeking to undo their last-second faux pas that saw their first-leg lead cancelled out with the last kick of the game, thanks to a Lamine Yamal penalty.

The Magpies go into the game in good spirits after a massive 1-0 win over Chelsea at Stamford Bridge at the weekend. An achievement Newcastle has not managed since 2012.

However, there's also a transfer cloud hanging over the club as there has been more speculation over the future of Sandro Tonali, with his agent Giuseppe Riso speaking to Italian media and seeing his words taken out of context in UK media.

Howe quizzed on Tonali's future

Howe was asked about Tonali's future today, and the gaffer said that all he sees is a player who is totally committed to the task in hand.

The boss accepted that we may be "led by the player" in terms of how this potential transfer saga pans out, but he's only seen positive things from the man himself, urging the Italian to "forget the noise."

"The person that matters the most is Sandro. All I've ever seen from him is someone who is totally committed. Very selfless at times, he's here for the team, not for himself. This is the attitude I've seen from him.

"Whenever you're in this situation, you really are led by the player. So, as I say, forget the noise around Sandro, he's just fully committed.

"He's been ill the last few days, but before that he's been fully committed to help our league form, and of course, he wants to do really well in this competition."

We don't see Sandro leaving this summer

We aren't as concerned about Sandro Tonali's immediate future as we are about Tino Livramento's. The writing looks to be on the wall for Tino to move to Manchester City, whereas we still feel pretty confident that Tonali will stick around beyond this season.

Newcastle might only get one more season out of him before he moves on, but as things stand, we get the impression that the rumours around his future are purely media-driven. N

The fact that Riso's words were twisted in a recent interview said a lot. They made it sound like the aim was to bring Tonali to Newcastle to gain access to a move to the likes of Man City or Arsenal, when in fact he was saying the aim was to bring him to England to be a star, suggests there's an agenda being pushed.

There's been nothing from Tonali himself to suggest he's got itchy feet, and he's proven the 'homesick' rumours to be false since the day he arrived at Newcastle and that narrative started.