Newcastle United have been handed a boost in their January pursuit of unsettled Tottenham Hotspur winger Andros Townsend.
Townsend has found game time extremely hard to come by under Spurs’ boss Mauricio Pochettino this season and appears to have fallen well down the pecking order at White Hart Lane.
The nimble winger has not started a Premier League game for the Lillywhites in over seven months and has accumulated just 64 minutes of first-team football as a substitute this campaign.
After Townsend failed to make it off the bench during Spurs’ November victory over Aston Villa, the disgruntled 24-year-old was involved in a heated row with a fitness coach and was subsequently reprimanded by being dropped from Pochettino’s first-team squad.
Since being frozen out by the Argentine coach, Townsend has requested game time for Spurs’ u21 side in an effort to maintain match sharpness and physical fitness.
Spurs chairman Daniel Levy recently spoke out about Townsend’s future at a Tottenham members’ forum (as quoted by London24), claiming that the out-of-favour wideman is free to leave the North London club if Pochettino deems him surplus to requirements:
If the football side say it affects the equilibrium of the squad if we have a player (Townsend) that doesn’t want to be here then we will look at it. In the end, it’s up to Mauricio Pochettino to decide who he does or doesn’t want.
The exasperated England international is angling for a January move away from White Hart Lane in order to maximise his dwindling chances of gaining a place in Roy Hodgson’s squad for this summer’s European Championships – and Newcastle are keen to offer Townsend a platform to impress.
The Magpies have desperately struggled for width this season, with out-and-out wingers Rolando Aarons and Gabriel Obertan ruled out through long-term injuries, and summer signing Florian Thauvin badly struggling to get to grips with the rigours of English football.
Big money summer acquisition Aleksandar Mitrovic – who thrives on quality crosses coming into the area – has been rendered wholly obsolete in recent weeks, and Townsend could be the man to finally provide the Serbian with the service that he craves.
Reports over the weekend suggested that Newcastle’s bitter rivals Sunderland were also interested in Townsend’s loan signature this January. However, the Black Cats already have a Spurs’ player amongst their ranks in American defender DeAndre Yedlin.
Premier League regulations state that a club cannot harbour more than one loan player from a rival top-flight side at any one time – ruling the Wearsiders out of anything other than a permanent deal for Townsend in the upcoming window.
