Premier League Profitability and Sustainability Rules saw Newcastle scramble to sell two young players before the June 30 deadline last month. Yankuba Minteh joined Brighton & Hove Albion while Elliot Anderson completed a move to Nottingham Forest with the two deals worth a combined £68million.
Anderson’s £35million move to Forest makes him Newcastle’s joint most expensive player sale with Andy Carroll while Minteh sits just behind the Geordie duo following a £33million move.
“It was a very difficult last couple of weeks of June,” Howe admitted. “The rules forced us to do things we didn’t want to do.
“I want to make that clear we didn’t want to sell any of the players we sold. Absolutely not. Why would we want to sell any of our promising young players? Elliot’s someone we’ve invested a lot of time in and it defied the inner feeling we all had associated with the club, it felt wrong.
“We wish Elliot and Yankuba all the very best in their next football clubs. It was a really difficult time, there was a lot of uncertainty and we didn’t know what was going to happen.
“In the end, it’s been as good as we could have hoped for in terms of us not being hit with a points deduction which was of course of paramount importance we did that. But we need to make sure we’re not in that position again.”
The significant income brought about by the player sales gives Newcastle freedom to spend this summer transfer window with Howe working with new sporting director Paul Mitchell to strengthen the squad with new signings. So far, Newcastle have added Lloyd Kelly, Odysseas Vlachodimos and John Ruddy while also completing a permanent £28million move for Lewis Hall from Chelsea.
But a marquee addition is still yet to be made with just over three weeks to go before the start of the 2024-25 Premier League season.
But Howe remained tight-lipped on any further transfer movement at the club as he told reporters: “Not [any transfers close] as far as I know. I don’t personally think we are close to anything, but as I said before I highlight the need that we do need to bring players in.
“Always quality over quantity.”
There are likely to be more transfer exits from Newcastle this summer with Kieran Trippier looking likely to leave the club while Miguel Almiron, Martin Dubravka, Callum Wilson and Sean Longstaff are also facing uncertain futures.
Howe admits he is still getting used to the significant changes that have taken place at Newcastle over the past month with the appointment of Mitchell as sporting director and James Bunce as performance director as well as the departures of Amanda Staveley and Mehrdad Ghodoussi.
Howe was questioned about how much control he has over transfers following the changes behind the scenes and the recruitment-driven nature of Mitchell’s role.
He replied: “I think these are things we are working on.”
