Newcastle have another £100m star in the making

Despite the constraints of FFP and PSR, Newcastle spent a sizeable £124m in the 2023/24 season, signing four players on permanent deals, and one player on a season-long loan.

The Magpies also let go of Allan Saint-Maximin and Chris Wood to recoup some of their money, bringing in around £23m for Saint-Maximin and around £15m for Wood, who is now smashing it at Nottingham Forest with eight goals in 11 games this season.

Harvey Barnes, Tino Livramento, and Yankuba Minteh were three of the permanent signings, but the biggest signing of the summer was Sandro Tonali, who signed from AC Milan for around £55m.

Sandro Tonali’s time at Newcastle

Before joining Newcastle, Tonali racked up 130 appearances for AC Milan in Italy, scoring seven goals and providing 13 assists in 9,158 minutes played.

Tonali is a highly-rated midfielder, who specialises in ball carrying in central areas, has a long passing range, and can win his duels going box to box in the middle of the park.

The Italian was out for the majority of last season through a betting suspension but has returned to the Newcastle starting XI as of late, making 11 appearances and, providing two assists in 562 minutes.

Tonali scored this week for Italy in their 1-0 victory over Belgium in the Nations League, keeping them top of Group 2 in League A.

But, Newcastle may have a midfielder even better than Tonali coming through their own ranks, and he also made his Newcastle debut in 2023, like the Italian.

Newcastle’s £100m man in the making

Lewis Miley came through Newcastle’s academy system, making his Premier League debut in May 2023. The 18-year-old has gone on to make 28 appearances in his short career thus far, scoring one goal and providing four assists in 1,744 minutes.

The young English midfielder is already valued at around £18m at just 18-years-old, and that has risen from a value of just £2m in the past 12 months, according to Transfermarkt. If Miley continues on this meteoric rise, there is no reason he cannot reach the same value as some of the finest English midfielders around.

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Take Declan Rice, for instance. Like Miley, he made his first-team bow at West Ham at a young age before being purchased for over £100m by Arsenal. The reason? Well, he’s a damn fine player but being English certainly helped his cause too.

Miley, whose tall 6 foot 2 frame makes him a strong duel winner, which is shown by his defensive metrics. Last term, he actually made 2.35 tackles per 90, and 1.63 blocks per 90, which was more than both Rice and Tonali managed.

The youngster has a good engine, allowing him to go box-to-box efficiently in a similar manner to Rice, impacting all phases for his side, a key trait for midfielders in the modern era.

Whilst the 18-year-old’s progression metrics are slightly worse than Rice and Tonali, he still shows an air of calm on the ball, looking to play through the lines, take the ball in tight spaces, and help in the attacking zones, as shown by his 2.16 shot-creating actions per 90.

With Arsenal’s club-record man eventually commanding a £105m fee by the time he was 24, Miley could well reach that same level, as we have already seen exponential growth from the teenager in the past 12 months.

If those progression numbers begin to improve, and the Toon teenager snatches the spot of Tonali, his value could be set to soar once again. Newcastle are already hoping for £100m for Alexander Isak and Anthony Gordon has also been touted at a similar price tag. Next could well be Miley.

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