All fair questions @burblish
Re Gordon. I don’t agree with any player ‘going on strike’ to get a move. I can see how Gordon’s position had become untenable and why he was so keen for the move but at the end of the day, your contract is such that you have agreed to play for a club until such a time that they decide they want to sell you or the contract ends.
Isak waiting until Ekitike had been sold to Liverpool doesn’t necessarily make it worse it just makes it even more unfathomable. Why?! Surely he knew that the club wouldn’t just let him walk with 3 years on his contract with no replacement?! I do believe that if we had bought Ekitike it would have unlocked the move for Isak if that’s what he wanted but to come out and say it’s what he was after after the sale had gone through makes even less sense. You don’t wait until the club you want to go to have dropped 80 million on someone in your position then demand that you’re allowed to go too.
The bit of me that is a conspiracy theorist or who is willing to think the worst of Isak thinks perhaps Liverpool had told him, look we want you, but we need another top quality striker as well so we’re going to get this guy, if you say you want to come to us first the likihood is Newcastle will outbid us and we’ll not get him so keep schtum, let us wrap that up then we'll come and get you. Which is so unthinkably shit in many ways but does explain his timing somewhat.
And I know loads will say ‘but he told Eddie this was his last season and he reminded him again at the end’. Two things. The club denies this. The likes of Ornstein etc were reporting at the end of the season that Isak was staying after we got champions league. All these reporters saying they knew Isak was done before this summer, I don’t believe for one minute they wouldn’t have reported it given how sensational that news would have been. It’s part of a narrative now to make it look like Alexander Isak is hard done to.
With regards to Trent not being a like for like situation, I agree, they aren’t exactly the same but there are similarities because as you say, there were some who were fuming he was leaving the club at all never mind it being for Real Madrid. However I would say that there is a lot of evidence that the media etc is being used as a tool to unsettle Isak further and to attempt to force Newcastle into a position where they want rid of him so much they will accept a lower offer than what they value him at. The 110 million offer was so far off what they have been very clear they value him at as to be bizarre. And I think Isak’s agent (read up on him/his group, v unsavoury characters) is absolutely one of the leaders in regards to this.
So in some respects, Trent leaving on a free so Liverpool get nothing and Isak and his agent along with Liverpool, playing silly cunts in the public arena in a bid to reduce the price the club gets for him purely so he gets what he wants, also feels like a similar kick in the teeth.
I’m just drained with it all, it’s spoilt our window, will absolutely have a knock on effect throughout the season and most of all I’m just disappointed because this is not the type of person I (or anyone else) believed he was.