Rallying after a frustrating 2023/24 campaign, Newcastle United and Eddie Howe marched toward the Carabao Cup title last season, and they qualified for the Champions League too.
The new term is well underway, but the Magpies are still finding their footing after a stormy transfer window.
There is no need to panic. Newcastle have carved out a new future over the past several years, and the shift in ownership and impetus runs deeper than merely the first team. Indeed, the club’s academy is working at a faster and more efficient pace than during the Mike Ashley era, and indeed the years preceding that interminable stretch.
It would be handy to have a homegrown forward burst onto the scene, helping Anthony Gordon and co adapt to this new Alexander Isak-less world.
But that can hardly be a given, and Gordon needs to step back up to the fore.
Anthony Gordon needs to step up
Now that Isak has left for pastures new, it is time for Gordon to set things straight and rekindle the verve that led him to being named Newcastle’s Player of the Year for 2023/24, having hit double figures for both goals and assists in the Premier League.
Last season yielded less fruitful returns for the England international, who only scored six times in the Premier League and lacked his previous confidence and authority, but he remains an immensely talented Premier League star, coveted by Liverpool last year and priced at £100m.
While that early-season defeat against the Reds in August put a dampener on Gordon’s resurgence, he bounced back with a consolation strike against Barcelona last week, and the 24-year-old will now look to build himself back to his former level.
Gordon is a high-class winger, and he’s bolstered by a range of talented Newcastle stars. However, Howe is sure to hope that one of the club’s most promising youngsters quickly breaks the surface, having already been compared with one Lamine Yamal.
Newcastle’s own Lamine Yamal
Newcastle can expect academy stars to emulate the likes of Elliot Anderson and Lewis Miley in wedging their way into the Toon first team, but they need the first-teamers to maintain a high level so as to ease them into the fray.
That’s why the understated addition of Vakhtang Salia could prove such an excellent piece of business for the Toon, with the Georgia U21 international having completed his move from Dinamo Tbilisi to Newcastle at the end of August, a year after a deal was agreed to sign the teenager.
Said to be “one of the best teenage prospects in the world” by journalist Graeme Bailey, Salia is powerful and agile and endowed with sharp pace when on the ball. His tactical dynamism lends itself to a range of different attacking berths.
Sadly, Howe and co will have to wait to see how the prospect settles into life in England since he has picked up a small hamstring injury before making his bow for the U21s.
It’s frustrating, but those in the know claim that it will be worth the wait, with Salia boasting a skillset that could see him rival the most talented youngsters in the Premier League.
There’s even a sense that Salia might have a bit of Yamal about him; only a few weeks ahead of his 18th birthday, the tricky forward is settling into his new life on Tyneside and brings a potent attacking threat, having scored eight goals and supplied four assists for Dinamo’s senior side.
Yamal will be dejected and perhaps even a touch aggrieved that his name was not etched onto the plaque, but Ousmane Dembele was a worthy winner after leading Paris Saint-Germain to a historic quadruple, winning their maiden Champions League title.
It is probably worth stressing that we are not advocating Salia’s talent to lie at the same level as Yamal’s, but there are undeniable similarities in the versatile forwards’ respective styles of play.
Salia, silky and dangerous when advancing, has quite naturally been likened to his world-class countryman Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, but one Barcelona analyst actually believes it is indeed Yamal who is more aptly comparable, remarking that the Georgian is “of a similar profile” to the prodigious Spaniard.
Ballon d’Or runner-up Yamal is one of the most exciting up-and-coming talents since Lionel Messi broke onto the scene way back when. He is that good.
A relentless, oft-unstoppable dribbler with an eye for flair and a natural clinical edge, Yamal has been described as “the best player in the world” by Chelsea’s Cole Palmer earlier in 2025.
To expect Salia to emulate him at St. James’ Park would be foolish indeed, but if Howe can manufacture a player of comparable athleticism and energy and approach play, it would be quite something.
This may feel like overblown praise, but United battled tooth and nail against some of Europe’s biggest hitters to sign this rising star, with Real Madrid and Bayern Munich both registering interest of their own before Newcastle secured his signature.
Hailed as an “elite talent” by Hungarian journalist Bence Bocsak, Salia has so much potential, and he’s in the right place to realise those natural qualities. However, for now, we must wait.
Everything suggests it will be worth it for those of a Newcastle persuasion, though.
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