Newcastle preparing opening bid for Johan Manzambi - Fabrizio Romano

Newcastle United are reportedly very keen on Switzerland midfielder Johan Manzambi and are close to making their move.

The Freiburg star has been attracting plenty of attention with his performances at the World Cup.

Newcastle fans were getting particularly excited this week after seeing what kind of player he is as he tore through the Algerian defence in midweek to set up Breel Embolo for Switzerland's opening goal in a 2-0 win.

Prior to that game, Newcastle were heavily linked with the 20-year-old, but after seeing what he did in that game against Algeria, there has been a bit of panic setting in on Tyneside that the Magpies could be beaten to his signing by a 'bigger' club.

Newcastle fans are understandably nervous

It has happened once this summer already with Victor Munoz, so Newcastle fans have good reason to be apprehensive, but there has been a bit of good news from Fabrizio Romano on Saturday night.

Taking to X, the Italian transfer guru has claimed that Newcastle is preparing their first official bid for Manzambi after positive talks with Freiburg.

"Newcastle are preparing opening official bid for Switzerland gem Johan Manzambi to be sent soon.

"Initial contacts made over recent days and proposal to SC Freiburg will follow. 

"He’s scored 3 goals, delivered 2 assists in excellent World Cup campaign so far."

No rival clubs mentioned in Fabrizio's post is a good sign

The fact that there was no mention of another club in Romano's post gives us some hope that Newcastle could get this one done.

We know how much Fabrizio Romano loves delivering bad news to Newcastle fans, so if he was aware of a rival bid, he'd have broken his neck to let us know about it.

There's still a way to go, obviously, but we're feeling mildly confident that this one gets done.