The last 12 months have seen Newcastle United sell Alexander Isak, Anthony Gordon, Sandro Tonali and Bruno Guimaraes.
Four players who had been very much at the heart of the success of recent years with two Wembley finals, two Champions League qualifications via Premier League top five finishes, plus of course a trophy.
The Newcastle United quartet leaving in deals that totalled £375m.
United banking £130m from Liverpool for Alexander Isak, Anthony Gordon joining Barcelona in a £70m deal, Sandro Tonali moving to Tottenham for £100m, then Bruno Guimaraes joining Arsenal for £75m.
An ongoing criticism from many in the media and indeed many Newcastle United fans, was that NUFC had to become better sellers.
I always found this laughable because the new Newcastle United owners and Eddie Howe had inherited a broken club and a squad of players that were getting relegated. Howe inherited a squad where if you’d sold the whole lot of them back in January 2022 it would have been an embarrassingly meagre amount for a Premier League club.
Eddie Howe was inspirational in the transfer market and in improving players beyond recognition as part of his team, especially those he had inherited. Newcastle United was a huge rebuilding job and the brilliant success under Howe in the transfer market saw him eventually assemble a team, though still a very small squad, of players that then brought the success to NUFC. The Wembley finals, the Champions League qualifications and the trophy. That success wouldn’t have happened if key players had been sold as quickly as others were added at the very early stages of the rebuild.
Anyway, fast forward to the present day and we HAVE now seen the selling of what were perceived as some of the very best Newcastle United players.
Have the sales of Alexander Isak, Anthony Gordon, Sandro Tonali and Bruno Guimaraes proved to be at the optimum moment in terms of selling them?
Were they sold at the moment when they would generate their very highest possible transfer fees?
Have Newcastle United now proved to be ‘good sellers’ or have they actually failed on this front?
I have looked at these four players that Newcastle United have sold in combined deals of £375m and given my estimate of what they would be sold for if put up for sale in January 2027.
Alexander Isak
The Liverpool striker was sold for £130m to Liverpool when aged 25 and will turn 27 later this month (September 2026).
Summer 2025 was disastrous for the scousers, after Arne Slot won the title with Jurgen Klopp’s team he was allowed to empty the Liverpool bank account with vast overpayments on numerous poor signings. The exception was an excellent striker signing. However, he was French not Swedish.
Eddie Howe had the vision in 2022 to pay £63m for a young striker who had only scored six La Liga goals the previous season, he formed a team around Alexander Isak to give him as many chances as possible.
With no longer any Eddie Howe to work with and no bespoke team built to suit his every whim , Isak has looked so poor. Add the ongoing injuries, real and imagined, plus outrageous wages he was awarded by Liverpool.
I think the very best Liverpool could do if selling Alexander Isak in January 2027 would be to maybe get half their money back, sold by Newcastle United for £130m I think Liverpool might get £65m if they are lucky.
Anthony Gordon
The winger was sold for £70m to Barcelona at the age of 25 and won’t turn 26 until February 2027.
I think it was a decent deal for all parties when the former Everton player left for La Liga.
I don’t think Newcastle United sold him on the cheap BUT I do think that having made such an impressive start at Barcelona, his value is heading only one way.
I believe Anthony Gordon will have an excellent season and in the months to come he will do really well in the Champions League in a high quality team that will give him a great platform.
On the back of that, if for whatever reason Barcelona decided to quickly offload him in January 2027, they would be looking at easily getting around £85m to £90m for Anthony Gordon.
Sandro Tonali
The 26-year-old midfielder sold to Tottenham for £100m, he won’t turn 27 until May 2027.
I don’t think you need to be a genius to realise that Spurs have massively overpaid on all their big signings this summer. On top of that they have had to pay huge wages to attract these signings to a club that is a total mess and which has finished fourth bottom each of the last two seasons.
Sandro Tonali even admitted that he’d never wanted to join Tottenham. He said that he and his partner had wanted him to join a Serie A club but none of them could afford his extortionate wage demands and transfer fee.
Having said he didn’t want to join Tottenham, the performances of Sandro Tonali for Tottenham in pre-season and the opening stages of this 2026/27 season appear to 100% back that up. Judge me by my actions not my words…in Sandro’s case both of these things are compelling evidence that this is a disaster for Spurs.
Having massively overpaid for some Man City reserves as well as the likes of Tonali, Fernandes and Van Hecke, as well as taking an over the hill Robertson off Liverpool, the Spurs transfer window has then seen a car crash end with desperate moves for Chelsea’s Tosin and Mudryk!!!
It was telling that no successful Premier League club was remotely interested in Sandro Tonali.
In their desperation Tottenham felt they had to agree a £100m transfer and make the Newcastle midfielder their best paid player.
Having paid Newcastle United around £30m+ more than his actual value in this window, Spurs have a huge problem now.
Sandro Tonali never wanted to go to Tottenham in the first place and as they look set for another fight to try and finish fourth (bottom), the Italy international is unlikely to be raising his spirits or game in this latest Spurs struggle against relegation.
If they did decide to try and sell Sandro Tonali in January 2027 (or any time in the future), having more than doubled his wages, Spurs have compounded the problem.
I reckon for another club to take him on in January 2027, Tottenham would get £60m at best for their £100m summer signing.
Bruno Guimaraes
The Brazil international sold for £75m to Arsenal will turn 29 in November, ahead of the January window.
Watching Bruno on Monday night against Villa when he came on as a sub, I have no doubt that his desire and ability is very much there for his new club.
However, time waits for no man and simple fact is that in 14 months time he will be 30 and having gone through his years at NUFC hardly missing a single game through injury, the bad one he picked up in February is looking a sign of things to come. Already picking up an injury with Arsenal that could be linked to that serious one earlier this year, the spirit of Bruno will continue to be willing but his age and demands on his body may say otherwise.
That will of course seriously affect his value and certainly Arsenal were never getting £75m back on him.
Arsenal valued Bruno Guimaraes at no more than £50m this summer but were forced to pay £75m to get him in the end.
I think if they did try to sell him in January 2027, their original £50m valuation would be the very most that any club would be willing to pay.
So adding all that up, what do the figures tell us?
Newcastle United in the last year did deals totalling £375m for Alexander Isak, Anthony Gordon, Sandro Tonali and Bruno Guimaraes.
If these same four players were to be sold in January 2027, my guesstimates suggest the quartet would generate no more than £260m, so a huge £115m in favour of Newcastle United when it comes to clever selling.
However, if we then take Anthony Gordon out of the equation.
Isak, Tonali and Bruno were sold for a combined £305m and in January they’d go for (in my opinion) £175m. That to me points to Newcastle United as outrageously good sellers!!!