They are getting hot under the collar up on Tyneside, all over the fact that little Southampton FC refuse to lay down and have their tummy tickled by the richest club in the World.
According to The Northern Echo in the North East, Newcastle United are getting very irate about their negotiations with Southampton over the signing of Tino Livramento, they claim that talks are continuing but that Saints keep moving the financial goalposts.
They even see that Saints starting Livramento in their friendly at Reading on Saturday was part of the act, all aimed at trying to push up the price that the St James's Park club are willing to offer.
From a Newcastle fans perspective they seem to be frustrated that Southampton are not just lying down and doing the bidding, fansite geordiebootboys.com seem to be taking that viewpoint, although they do concede that their club "must believe that Livramento is a worthwhile investment – otherwise they would have walked away a long time ago."
From a Southampton perspective it is a lot different, a few weeks ago the news out of Tyneside was that Newcastle had set a transfer budget of £75 million and that being the case a top figure of £15 million was quoted as the most they could pay.
Yet here we are now and they have already spent around £100 million on just two players Sandro Tonali & Harvey Barnes, bringing in just £15 million for Chris Wood to balance the books .
Yet they are now upped their bid from the derisory £15 million, ironically the same price they paid last year for former Saints left back Matt Targett(no comparison here) to £30 million.
So given they are the richest club in the world and we are now a poor Championship club, how dare we hold out for more money, indeed how dare we hold out for more for a player who like us they clearly think is a great talent.
Saints need to sell this summer and yes they do need to sell players in certain positions fast in order to bring in money to pay for them, but that does not mean that we should allow ourselves to be held to be pushed into a cheap sale.
Tino Livramento is under contract for another 3 years, for a year during his first two years at the club he was injured and we paid his wages, whilst i am not naive enough to think that a proffessional footballer thinks that means he owes the club anything, it does mean that the lets say £2 million we paid him in wages reduces down our potential profit.
So if Newcastle played silly buggers with us by offering stupendously low money for him a few weeks ago, excuse me for not shedding a tear now for their frustration about Southampton doing the same now by asking for more.
A month ago Newcastle offered a low figure not in the real belief they would get him that low, but to unsettle the player, to make him want to go to St James's Park and why wouldn't he, they are the richest club in the World, but also to try and make out they weren't really that bothered, the aim to be to get an unsettled player to force his current club to sell him at less than the going rate.
This isn't a Newcastle thing, its a football thing, it is just that some don't get as upset about it as others when they don't get their own way and have to pay the going rate.
Southampton FC have been lambasted by their fans over the last few years for selling players, truth is non were dragged away by wild horses, screaming to stay, now things are different, the club will not be held to ransom to sell a player under his market value, they are quite happy for him to stay at St Mary's another year, if he does then perhaps the £30 million that Newcastle are offering now will seem a snip.