Pardew’s bold swoop shows Newcastle what they threw away
Published:
While Newcastle go round in circles chasing the likes of PSV’s Georginio Wijnaldum, QPR’s Charlie Austin and Bordeaux’s Diego Rolan, old gaffer Alan ‘Pardiola’ Pardew is on the verge of making one of the signings of the summer at Crystal Palace.
Having caved in to Paris Saint-Germain’s £20m bid for Yohan Cabaye when St James’ Park chief 18 months ago, Pardew has brokered a deal to bring the French international back over the Channel for half that fee, according to a raft of reports.
No lesser an authority than the BBC believes Cabaye will undergo a medical at Selhurst Park ahead of a £10m switch having failed to nail down a regular first-team place at the Parc des Princes, starting just 22 Ligue 1 games and bagging three goals in 53 all-competition fixtures.
That won’t bother the Eagles’ faithful a jot after the attacking-midfielder’s fantastic two-and-a-half-season stint in the Premier League between 2011 and 2014.
He scored seven goals and laid on two assists in 19 top-flight fixtures for the Geordies during the first half of the 2013/14 campaign, so Palace will be understandably buoyed by the imminent arrival of a Premier League-ready star.
This is the second time Pardew has stuck it to Newcastle (who would surely welcome back Cabaye with open arms at this price) as the former Eagles midfielder left the north-east outfit to flounder halfway through last season.
Palace went from 18th when the 53-year-old took over in January to 10th by the end of term, while Newcastle very nearly managed the reverse under interim boss John Carver, who spurned his mid-table inheritance and only kept Mike Ashley’s plaything up on the last day of the campaign.
The question that has to be asked is why did Ashley want rid of Pardew in the first place?
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