SO LONG, GERVINHO, IT'S BEEN GOOD NOT KNOWING YOU

Word comes today that Newcastle United's romance with Lille and Ivory Coast quasi-striker Gervinho has cooled. At least on United's side.

I would call that news overdue.

Sought-after players are often coy with the press and potential suitors. But it takes a special breed to say one thing to a major news outlet in the morning and the exact opposite thing to another major news outlet the same afternoon. We're coming up on two weeks past Gervinho's originally scheduled announcement of where he'd land. And there was evidence of character issues on the part of the player well before he was on the market. Applause to NUFC for saying, enough.

Arsenal, Liverpool and Manchester City are reported to still have interest in Gervinho. Any of those clubs is welcome to him as far as I'm concerned. I continue to suspect, however, that the bidding war over Gervinho is more manufactured than real - a figment of his two agents' and a thousand tweeting fans' imaginations. There's still been no actual bid reported from anyone, deep pockets notwithstanding.

Predicting this transfer market is like herding chipmunks. Here's a limb I'll step out on, though: Gervinho will be back at Lille next season. Would that Newcastle's rivals in England were reckless enough to take him.

Comments

[Ryan]

You know, I am glad we won't sign him. He was playing games and beating around the bush. I only want players that want to be at Newcastle. From what Pardew says, that's his outlook too. Barton definitely wants to stay and has said so, so I really hope we can keep him. If nothing else, it seems he is wanting to pay back that loyalty Newcastle showed when he was going through his personal issues.

That's also why I like the Cabaye signing. He seems to have genuinely wanted to come to newcastle and didn't jerk us around. Zog wants to come back too. And people making fun of Erding before they watched him play is silly. I watched a couple of PSG matches on Fox Soccer and I must say he definitely has the talent to play for us. Plus signings from French leagues have paid off so far, so we might as well keep at it. It would seem some of the other big clubs tend to overlook Ligue 1 a bit. Maybe it's just me though.