Johan Manzambi’s proposed move to Newcastle now hijacked by Aston Villa

Newcastle United look set for another transfer blow this summer, hot on the heels of missing out on Victor Munoz to Liverpool.

There was a big fear inside the club and especially amongst fans that the longer it took Newcastle to get a deal done for Johan Manzambi the less likely it was to happen.

While things weren't as far advanced this time as they were with Victor Munoz, if the rumours that Aston Villa are set to beat Newcastle to his signing are true, then this is a massive blow.

Newcastle had an agreement in place with Freiburg, albeit a verbal one, but they had not yet fully convinced Manzambi himself of the move.

Johan Manzambi chose Aston Villa over Newcastle

Reports on Sunday afternoon claimed that Newcastle were hoping to get in touch with Manzambi now that Switzerland were out of the World Cup, but it now looks as though Aston Villa have beaten us to the punch.

Within minutes of each other, David Ornstein and Luke Edwards were posting on X about Aston Villa hijacking Newcastle's deal with Ornstein saying that Villa were finalising a deal, and saying in The Athletic that Villa accelerated their interest following the injury to Andre Onana

"Manzambi looked on course to join Newcastle United after a club-to-club agreement was reached, but the 20-year-old had yet to decide on his preferred destination.

"That enabled Villa to accelerate their existing interest, which was heightened by the loss of Amadou Onana to a knee ligament injury.

"They have since intensified efforts to strike a deal with their Bundesliga counterparts and the player, who favours a move to Villa Park."

Fan meltdown loading....

We shouldn't be at all surprised; it always felt likely to happen, especially after his displays for Switzerland at the World Cup. 

If we'd have qualified for Europe last season then maybe things would have turned out differently in both this case and the Victor Munoz one, but when you're trying to sell success and you don't have the evidence to back it up, you're at a huge risk of having another club come in who can say, we've got European football next season so you don't have to wait.

According to Luke Edwards, Newcastle have been looking at alternatives since Friday, so they've seen this one coming.

We wonder who is going to get blamed for this one. We saw some wild theories when Liverpool took Victor Munoz away from us. It was Eddie Howe's fault, Ross Wilson's fault. It just seems easier to blame people than to accept the reality that we just aren't an attractive proposition at the minute, with no Europe to offer and our bigger players leaving.

The rails have come off the project; nobody can deny that, but there's a new project building. Unfortunately, it feels like we're going to have to start from scratch. We got too good too quickly, and now we're suffering for it.