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We used Football Manager 2026 to find out what Newcastle’s transfer business might look like in January.
Although there are still a couple of months to go before teams can sign players again, sides like Newcastle United will already be doing a lot of groundwork as they plan their moves for January – but just how many deals do the Magpies need to make to give themselves the best possible shot at making the top four once more? And which kind of players should they sign?
To help us paint a picture of what kind of business Eddie Howe and his transfer team might conduct this winter, we turned to the most accurate simulation of the footballing future available – Football Manager 2026.
We loaded up a save and sent Newcastle (and the rest of the Premier League, of course) a year or so into the future to find out just how much money they might spend and who they might sign, at least according to the most finely-tuned football-focussed AI in the game. And let’s just say that they didn’t have a quiet January in our game…
Newcastle sign Chelsea & Arsenal stars in £142.5m January spending spree – according to FM26
As in real life, the January transfer window can be quite quiet in the world of Football Manager, at least in previous editions. The game predicts that Newcastle will go wild this winter, however, and they either paid (or obligated themselves to pay) a massive £142.5m in the space of a month in our save. Let’s see how they spent it…
Axel Disasi – loan with £36m obligation to buy from Chelsea: Newcastle have often been linked with a deal for Disasi in real life, so this gives us a chance to see how it might pan out. The answer is not very well – Disasi made just seven appearances, mostly from the bench, for the second half of the 2025/26 season, and didn’t play remarkably well. Given his form at Chelsea and Aston Villa over the past two seasons, that does track.
Carlos Álvarez - £46m from Levante: We’ll be honest here – we had not heard of the 22-year-old Álvarez, a right winger who has (in real life) scored twice in his first 10 La Liga appearances for Levante since they were promoted this summer. In the game, he was sufficiently exciting for Newcastle to pick him out to provide Anthony Elanga with some competition on the right – and scored twice in 14 league appearances after a big-money move to Tyneside.
Vitor Roque - £33m from Palmeiras: Now this would set some pulses racing. Presumably worried by Yoane Wissa’s fitness and his trip to the Africa Cup of Nations, our virtual Newcastle signed another striker who has, in the real world, been identified as one of the brightest young talents in the game, struggled at Barcelona, and looked quite brilliant again after moving back to Brazil. He scores four goals in 11 games in our save, and we know that he goes on to be one of the best striker in the world. Not a bad deal.
Christian Nørgaard - £9.75m from Arsenal: A bit of an oddity, this. Nørgaard only moved to the Emirates this summer but he wasn’t getting a game for the Gunners in our save, so Newcastle swept in to bag a bit more midfield depth. At that price point, this would be a pretty shrewd signing by any sensible standards.
Andreas Skov Olsen – loan to buy for £9m: A versatile winger or midfielder of relatively modest talent, Skov Olsen seems to be a budget depth piece for Howe and only made one league start in our save. A bit of a shrug of a signing, in truth.
Andrés Martin - £8.75m from Racing Santander: We have no idea why our virtual Newcastle made this deal. Installed as a fringe player, Martin is – like Skov Olsen – a versatile attacking player but barely good enough for the top flight on paper. He still made nine appearances and scored a goal somewhere down the line.
The result of all that big spending in January? Newcastle finished eighth and missed out on European football. Still, Roque and Álvarez look like sound long-term investments… but maybe £50m or so on a couple of back-up wingers and Disasi wouldn’t be all that smart of a move.
The Spurs & Everton deals that Newcastle strike to sell current stars
Now, fans who pay attention to the financial side of the game might, quite reasonably, wonder how they spent all that money when the club are quite vocal about the restraints imposed on them by the profit and sustainability rules. Well, some of it was loans to buy which pushes the money down the road, and there was no doubt some clever virtual amortisation going on, but there were also a couple of significant sales which may not go down all that well…
Joelinton - £46m to Tottenham Hotspur: This deal would probably go down like a lead balloon on Tyneside in real life, but in our save the battling defensive midfielder was sent to Spurs for a relatively tidy but hardly overwhelming sum. At least it was enough to buy Axel Disasi..?
Jacob Murphy - £9m to Everton: Surely, Murphy is worth more in real life, but his attributes aren’t all that amazing in the game and Everton were able to hash out a cut-price January deal for the winger. Which perhaps explains why they ended up signing Skov Olsen and Martin for twice the total price.
Lewis Miley – loan to Burnley: Miley was sent to Turf Moor to get some playing time in the game, which seems sensible enough, although perhaps less so given Joelinton’s departure. He was a regular with Burnley, at least, and did help them to dodge the drop. He might have helped Newcastle make it to Europe had he stayed, however…
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