Alan Pardew is hoping Newcastle can reach an agreement that will allow their African stars to remain at the club until the middle of January.
Magpies boss hoping to keep Ba and Tiote until mid-January
Alan Pardew is hoping Newcastle can reach an agreement that will allow their African stars to remain at the club until the middle of January.
Demba Ba and Cheick Tiote are due to head off on international duty in the New Year, with the 2012 African Cup of Nations set to be held in Gabon and Equatorial Guinea.
Senegal are expected to call on Ba, while Tiote is likely to figure prominently in the Ivory Coast's plans.
Staging the competition in the middle of the European season often causes problems for club managers, with key players set to miss almost a month of domestic action.
Pardew accepts that he will be without the services of Ba and Tiote for a few weeks at the start of 2012, but he is hoping that their respective departures from St James' Park can be delayed.
Scheduling
"It's so important for us to have the African Nations players as long as possible," he said, with international teams able to call upon those selected up to two weeks before the competition gets under way on 21st January.
"We feel that Demba could possibly stay until the 15th and we will be hoping that Cheick does too."
Pardew added: "The scheduling isn't great for us. But we knew about it before the start of the season so we aren't going to moan about it. It was there and is something that has been on our mind.
"I still think our squad is big enough to cope."
While Pardew is confident the Magpies can handle the loss of two key men, he is uncertain as to whether the group currently at his disposal can mount a sustained push for European qualification.
Compete
He would like to think that they can, but admits that there is only so much they can achieve while working on a budget that is considerably tighter than many of their Premier League rivals.
Pardew said: "Our best team can compete with any team in this Premier League.
"Whether we have got a strong enough squad to keep us consistently in the top seven all year, we will have to wait and see.
"But certainly, we still have a nice margin over the rest.
"Tottenham, Liverpool, Manchester United, Manchester City, Chelsea are way, way above us in terms of budgets and everything else, so we are doing absolutely fabulously, make no mistake about that."
