Newsletter

Get your daily update and weekly newsletter by signing up today!

News

Newcastle United had offer for Bas Dost rejected this summer – Record

5 years ago
Share

The reports of Newcastle United being set to buy Bas Dost, started around the same time as Andy Carroll left Tyneside for Liverpool.

At the time, back in 2011, both striker were 22 years old.

Since that point, pretty much every transfer window we have seen claims that both strikers were set to sign for Newcastle United.

Eventually, at the seventeenth time (transfer window) of asking, Andy Carroll did sign for NUFC (for the second time) on the final day of this summer 2019 transfer window.

Now there are new reports from Portugal that earlier this summer, Newcastle tried to sign Bas Dost.

The Portuguese newspaper Record, say that Newcastle wanted to loan the Dutch international with an option to buy but that this was quickly rejected by Sporting  Lisbon.

Back in June (see below) there were reports that Newcastle wanted to buy Bas Dost and that Sporting were willing to take £11m for the striker, a considerable drop on previous supposed valuations that were around the £40m figure that Newcastle paid for Joelinton.

With the other major European leagues still having their transfer windows open, Eintracht Frankfurt are now reported by Record to be favourites to buy Bas Dost for around £10m. They are currently operating on a transfer surplus of around £40m this summer, having banked a combined £90m for strikers Jovic (signed by Real Madrid) and Haller (West Ham), as well as loaning out Jetro Willems to Newcastle amongst other deals.

Bas Dost appeared as a sub in the first of two league games played by Sporting this season so far and started their 5-0 Super Cup defeat to Benfica.

It would have been transfer window bingo heaven for many Newcastle fans if finally NUFC had signed both Andy Carroll and the Dutchman. It would also have been a sizeable front two if the pair of them had ever appeared on the pitch together, Bas Dost at 6ft 5 an inch taller than Carroll.

One even bigger advantage if Newcastle had signed Bas Dost instead of Andy Carroll, would have been his predicted minutes on the pitch. The Dutchman having started 77 league games (off the bench in another six) in Portugal these past three seasons and scoring 76 goals.

The Mag – 29 June 2019:

I never feel like summer has truly arrived until we get our first sighting of ‘Bas Dost set to sign for Newcastle United’ in the media.

This time it (Bas Dost signing / Summer) has come slightly later this year.

The 29 June 2019 to be exact, at last some light relief after everything Mike Ashley has thrown at us.

In the past there have been claims that Mike Ashley had bid £35m for the Dutch striker but after almost a decade of being linked at last the price is now heading downwards after year after year of going up.

In Portugual, O Jogo are reporting/claiming that Newcastle United want to sign the striker and Sporting Lisbon are happy to sell.

Bas Dost is now 30 and he still has two years left to go on wages of £55,000 a week which is claimed to be the prime motivation of Sporting to now move him on.

The Portuguese club said to be willing to take around £11m to do a quick deal.

They report that Sevilla are also interested but so far have bid only £7m.

As for the striker himself, Bas Dost is only interested in a move if it is to an ‘elite’ club.

Well, I don’t know about ‘elite’ but certainly Mike Ashley’s Newcastle United are truly a club run like no other.

As well as his age going up, the striker’s goals are going down, in the weak Portuguese league these past three years, Bas dost has scored 34, 27 and then 15 last season, although he did miss a number of games through injury.

My two previous Bas Dost articles on The Mag:

 7 June 2018:

A bit like an Andy Carroll one, you are never having to wait long for a Bas Dost transfer to Newcastle United report.

Two months ago I wrote (see below) about the first sighting of a summer NUFC Bas Dost transfer story as early as April.

Maybe a new record, maybe not.

Last summer was a classic, when despite Rafa Benitez being forced to shop in the bargain aisles for new players, an exclusive was put out, and repeated everywhere, that Newcastle United had had an offer of  €40m (approx £35m) turned down by Sporting Lisbon.

So after waiting 13 years for the NUFC record to be broken, Mike Ashley was suddenly going to pay more than double what Michael Owen had cost, for a then 28 year old striker who had only really proved himself in the weak Dutch and Portuguese leagues.

Rarely a regular starter for Wolfsburg, Bas Dost managed only 32 goals in four years in the Bundesliga.

Whilst last summer’s claims were laughable, I find the latest ones this week side-splitting.

It appears that it is Marca in Spain who have put the story around and the English media are blindly copying it.

Amusingly, they claim that Sevilla and Newcastle are now battling to sign the player for NOTHING, with other clubs also interested.

The story goes that following an attack on manager and players by Sporting Lisbon fans last month, upset at missing out on Champions League football, Bas Dost is thinking about walking out on Sporting Lisbon and signing for somebody else.

It is a classic, so a player who was ‘worth’ £35m last summer, is now going to be allowed to walk away for nothing by Sporting Lisbon in the middle of his contract…

The claims are of course nonsense BUT if for example we did accept there is truth in the walking away story, how could anybody imagine that Mike Ashley would be prepared to bid and win in an auction on paying the highest wages?

Whilst claims of him ever being worth £35m were ridiculous, Bas Dost would feasibly be worth at least around £15m in this current market.

So if no transfer fee was payable, his wages would be massive.

As I said back in April (see below), when the Dutch striker’s career eventually ends, Newcastle United should do the decent thing and give him a testimonial, in recognition of his never ending service to NUFC transfer speculation.

10 April 2018:

Bas Dost seems to have been in the lives of Newcastle fans since..well, difficult to remember when he wasn’t.

The 6ft 5 Dutch striker turns 29 in May and looking back, he has certainly been linked with a move to Newcastle ever since he was a 22 year old making his name in Holland with Heerenveen.

Then every transfer window since, I’m pretty sure Newcastle have been going to buy him, according to at least one or two media outlets.

Sometimes NUFC ‘have made bids’, ‘had bids accepted’, ‘been in talks with the player’, ‘been in talks with his club(s)’, and so on.

April 2018 and once again Bas Dost and Newcastle United are mentioned in the same sentence.

He has scored a load of goals in the very poor Portuguese league with Sporting Lisbon, 54 in 54 league starts, though I’m guessing you have to take that as being on the same level as if he’d scored that number in the Scottish pub league.

Anyway, the Portuguese media are claiming that he now wants to move on and his agent is looking for a new club in a better league, with Newcastle United one of the clubs (predictably) brought up in the reports.

It is one of the first signs of summer I look for – Newcastle being linked with Bas Dost – but this time it has come far earlier than other obvious signs of summer, such as men (not on a football pitch) wearing shorts, petrol stations doing the hard sell on B-B-Q stuff, wasps appearing, and pubs taking bookings for Christmas.

A year ago after scoring loads of goals in the Portuguese pub league, Newcastle were laughably said to be interested in signing Bas Dost (for some reason, whenever I hear/see his name, I always think of the classic Phoenix Nights and their ‘Das Boot’ German fruit machine) for £40m, so god knows what price tag will be put on him this time.

By the time the transfer window opens, the Dutch striker will be 29 years of age, and after only one half decent season (16 goals) in four years in the Bundesliga when at Wolfsburg, difficult to see anybody, let alone Mike Ashley’s NUFC paying massive money for the Dutch international (1 goal in 18 appearances for Holland).

In honour of his ‘connection’ with Newcastle United, maybe Bas Dost could/should be given a testimonial at the end of his career, so Newcastle fans can at last see him in the flesh…

Share

If you would like to feature on The Mag, submit your article to contribute@themag.co.uk

Have your say

© 2024 The Mag. All Rights Reserved. Design & Build by Mediaworks