Three options now present themselves to Newcastle United with Alexander Isak | OneFootball

This is where Newcastle United are at with Alexander Isak.

With three options now presenting themselves.

A trio of possibilities for how this Alexander Isak impasse will end.

You might not like any of the three options.

Indeed, none of them are ideal.

However, we don’t live in an ideal world and sometimes you have no alternative but to make the least worst choice.

These are now the three Alexander Isak options, in my humble opinion. What’s your choice?

Sell Alexander Isak on the cheap

Bank £110m from Liverpool, maybe £120m at the very most.

Play him in the reserves for the duration of the 2025/26 season.

Keep Alexander Isak and…

Eddie Howe plays him in the Newcastle United team this 2025/26 season.

Evaluating these three options

Option One

I don’t know about you, but letting Liverpool profit from their devious tactics of unsettling Isak to try and get him on the cheap…never in a month of Sundays am I going for this option. The Newcastle United owners and Eddie Howe undoubtedly thinking the same. If Liverpool had acted professionally and done everything by the book and offered £150m+, it would still have been sickening to see him go to Anfield. However, for him to do so some £40m below his valuation, no way.

You have to also take into consideration the knock on effect if United bowed down to Liverpool and let a star player go on the cheap, thanks largely to a club unsettling that player to try and get that very outcome. Many clubs would love to have Tonali, Bruno, Hall, Livramento, Gordon etc but know they are wasting their time, due to Newcastle’s clear determination not to sell them and the high valuation that United attach to each of them. All of that crumbles if Alexander Isak leaves fir £110m.

Option Two

This is a very understandable emotional response for any Newcastle fan. Let’s punish Alexander Isak for what he has done, let him rot in the reserves all season.

In the real world though, with your head not your heart, surely no Newcastle fan really believes this is a viable option.

Anybody who actually does so, would no doubt be the ones screaming the loudest at Eddie Howe if United were struggling for goals this season, with Osula and Neave up front (a scenario that could present itself even if Wissa is signed as expected but has to be rested at times, or worse, picks up a bad injury).

Option Three

As I said at the start, sometimes real life means you have to make the least worst choice.

In this case, by default, with the first two options not really any kind of options at all, it has to be option three.

Alexander Isak comes back into the team and Newcastle United get on with this 2025/26 season.

For those who say this is impossible.

The history of football says anything is possible.

When the most Geordie of Geordies, black and white through and through, Lee Clark signed for Sunderland. That to me proved anything was possible.

Whilst as for players trying to force their way out of clubs but ultimately not doing so and ending up playing one or more extra seasons at the club they were trying to get out of, there are countless examples. Kieron Dyer tried to get out of Newcastle and ended up staying years more, Harry Kane at Spurs was the same.

There is always room for compromise and the reality is that Alexander Isak needs to play football this coming season and Newcastle United need a lot of goals. Even if Liverpool belatedly did the proper decent thing and paid the transfer fee that all along they knew was the minimum before any chance of getting his signature this summer, it is too late now.

At the start of June maybe Newcastle United would have considered the situation differently if pressed. With time and opportunity to bring in a couple of quality strikes to replace his goals, United could have almost certainly at that point done so. Maybe even an understanding with Liverpool that if they wanted Isak then they should stand back and let Newcastle have a free run on Hugo Ekitike.

This isn’t 2011 and Mike Ashley selling Newcastle’s star striker and then replacing him with a bemused clubless veteran Shefki Kuqi.

History shows that of course many fans won’t be happy at the sight of Alexander Isak stepping onto the pitch once again in black and white. Reality is that once the whistle goes we just get on with supporting the team. Keyboard warriors may continue to abuse him but reality is that all that matters is supporting Eddie Howe and the team he selects in any match.

A new contract will be agreed, Alexander Isak will get some more money, a release clause and/or agreement will be included to allow him to leave next summer if he chooses BUT in a far more straightforward way, whilst Isak himself will have far more choices available, as a number of European clubs could be looking for a new first choice striker next summer.