Young players on Newcastle’s summer shopping list, says Eddie Howe

NEWCASTLE: Eddie Howe has revealed that Newcastle United will take a slightly altered summer transfer approach in contrast to their January window raid. The Magpies added five players in the winter window to become the biggest spenders in world football as they added Bruno Guimaraes, Kieran Trippier, Dan Burn, Matt Targett, and Chris Wood. While hardened Premier League experience was required for a relegation battle, United do not expect to be in the same kind of fight next season, especially as their current form is more Champions League than championship.

And as a result, Howe is expecting to be able to add a different type of player when the window opens in the Premier League on June 10 — with bringing down the average age of the squad paramount. “Yeah, definitely,” said the head coach when asked whether younger players would be targeted. “I think January, in a specific window, we felt we needed Premier League experience, Premier League-ready, and we couldn’t take chances on younger players with different levels and who would take time to adapt to the team.

We were after a very specific player in January. I think that changes now. “We need to look at the age of the squad, it goes without saying that every year the squad gets a year older.

Before you know it, if you’re not careful you can become imbalanced, and that’s something we need to consider and think about going forward.” While Guimaraes and Targett are both in their mid-twenties, Burn and Wood, both 30, and Trippier, 31, are at the more experienced end of the spectrum. Howe is not ruling out some experienced additions this summer — with Leicester City and Denmark’s Kaspar Schmeichel linked in recent days — however, younger models are preferred. He said: “I