Newcastle to rival Barcelona & Juventus for 'next Sven Botman'

Stuart Telford

• 10 Nov 2023 16:13 GMT
• 3 min read

Newcastle are in the market for a new centre-back and have shortlisted Lille's Tiago Djalo, but know they will face competition from around Europe according to a report.

Botman has missed Newcastle's last nine games with a knee injury and recently returned to his native Netherlands for further treatment.

Club captain Jamaal Lascelles has been playing in his stead, but with Dan Burn, who has been starring at left-back of late, also now injured, Eddie Howe's side are light on cover at the back.

READ: Premier League to vote on BAN to stop controversial Newcastle transfer

Botman joined Newcastle from Lille for €37 million in July 2022, and the club are set to return to that source for reinforcements.

"Newcastle United are keeping close tabs on the progress of Lille centre-back Tiago Djalo and are ready to battle for his signature in 2024," reports 90min's Graeme Bailey. "Djalo is a player that Newcastle are huge admirers and have been tracking him for over a year now."

Injury concern

Djalo is out of contract at the end of the season but the Magpies could move in January, even if Lille ask for more than the €9.4m he is currently valued at by FootballTransfers' in-house algorithm.

READ: Who is Tiago Djalo? Ligue 1 title winner previously at Milan impressing at Lille

A potential hiccup could be the fact that Djalo is currently sidelined with a torn ACL in his knee, but it is understood Newcastle are monitoring his progress, with his return to first-team action now expected to be a matter of weeks away.

Djalo is capable of playing across the back-line, so could plug the gaps left but Botman or Burn, but Newcastle do face competition, and not just from Inter Milan, as recently reported by Fabrizio Romano.

"Juventus, Barcelona, Atletico Madrid, Borussia Dortmund and Bayer Leverkusen are all showing an interest in Djalo…" continued the report.

Newcastle beat AC Milan to Botman's signature the summer before last, and there is nothing to suggest the world's richest club won't win the race for Djalo too.