The £150m-rated Sweden striker has effectively gone on strike as he holds out for a transfer to champions Liverpool
As a player at Bournemouth and Portsmouth Eddie Howe could invariably be found reading the foreign news pages of the broadsheets while travelling to matches on the team bus.
More than two decades on, the Newcastle manager’s ability to construct carefully worded sentences loaded with calibrated between-the-lines subtext make it easy to imagine him as some sort of international envoy.
This skill set dictates that few Premier League counterparts can be better equipped to confront a problem such as Alexander Isak. Yet, behind a resolutely brave face, even Newcastle’s manager acknowledges, albeit tacitly, that he has lost control of the situation.
The Sweden striker is so keen to force through a move to Liverpool that he has, in effect, gone on strike. After resisting overtures to be reintegrated with the squad, Isak continues to train alone and, it is understood, will shortly be fined the maximum permissible two weeks’ wages for making himself unavailable for Saturday’s season opener at Aston Villa.
