Longstaff has been offered a £30,000-a-week contract by Serie A club Udinese
Saturday 4 July 2020 08:15, UK
Newcastle manager Steve Bruce says he is hoping to convince midfielder Matty Longstaff to stay at the club.
Longstaff, who could leave his boyhood club at the end of the season, has been offered a five-year deal worth £30,000 a week by Serie A club Udinese.
Newcastle would be due just £400,000 in compensation if Longstaff were to leave for Italy at the end of his contract.
The 20-year-old, who has featured in seven Premier League matches since his goalscoring debut against Manchester United in October, earns just £850 per week on an academy deal at Newcastle.
"Matty (Longstaff)? I have got a meeting this (Friday) afternoon with him," Bruce said.
"I am hoping that will be positive. We are still hoping we can overcome something. We don't want to be losing our young players, we don't want to be losing our best players.
"It's important we try and get over the line with Matty because he is a young player from the area. We don't want to lose him.
"We are seeing a lot now of young players being tempted abroad. I hope Matty stays and sees his career is here in Newcastle."
The Toon boss also revealed he will sit down with loanees Nabil Bentaleb, Danny Rose and Valentino Lazaro in the next few weeks to discuss their futures.
All three players have options to make their moves permanent.
Bruce added: "We've extended them (loans) to the end of the season.
"The difficulty is for all of us as clubs now is; when are we starting again? Where are the finances at? We haven't really had that conversation yet, we are all delighted just to get back playing.
"They are the talking points of us going forward. We'll have those conversations over the next two, three, four, five weeks. It doesn't help with takeover talk in the background.
"That's why we want that little bit of clarity because we need to keep moving forward."
Bruce, meanwhile, insists he will not allow Newcastle to coast to the Premier League finishing line after guiding them to safety with weeks to spare.
The Magpies' 4-1 win at Bournemouth on Wednesday evening took them through the 40-point barrier and left them looking upwards rather than over their shoulders for what remains of the campaign.
However, head coach Bruce is in no mood to rest on his laurels with 18 more points still to play for.
He said: "We've achieved the first goal. A lot of people wrote the team and myself off in the first few weeks. I'm delighted for everybody we're a Premier League team again, and that was the first job to be done.
"Now we've given ourselves the platform to see if we can mount a challenge and get in the top 10. If we can, that would be hugely satisfying.
"My job is to keep them focused on it. We've only got two or three weeks to the finish and we've got some big games coming up against some big teams. It's still all to play for."
Newcastle play West Ham live on Sky Sports Premier League from 2pm on Sunday.
