The stunning Newcastle & Manchester City swap deal that could give both teams what they wantplaceholder image
The stunning Newcastle & Manchester City swap deal that could give both teams what they want | Getty Images
Manchester City and Newcastle have been linked with a surprising and ambitious swap deal - is it a transfer that might take place in 2026?
Most people involved with Manchester City are probably pretty content with the way things are going right now. They’ve lost just one of their last 14 matches, Erling Haaland is scoring goals at a frightening rate, and the early-season rust seems to have been shaken off. There’s only one person at the Etihad with good cause to be upset at the moment – James Trafford.
The goalkeeper moved to City over the summer for a transfer fee of £27m expecting to be their first choice. Instead, his new employers jumped at the chance to snap up Gianluigi Donnarumma just a few weeks later, and now England’s most gifted young goalkeeper is stuck warming the bench.
The Manchester City & Newcastle swap deal in the gossip columns
The story starts with TeamTalk, who claim that City are considering using Trafford as part of a cash-plus-player deal to sign Livramento in 2026 – a player they have reportedly been monitoring for some time.
The 23-year-old isn’t for sale, and this report even describes him as being seen as “untouchable” at St. James’ Park – but they are also more than a little interested in Trafford, who they attempted to sign from Burnley before he made the move to Manchester instead.
Negotiations over Trafford dragged on for weeks early in the recent summer transfer window before the proposed deal collapsed, but Newcastle are still said to be “keen” on him as they look to find a long-term replacement for Nick Pope – a good goalkeeper but now, at 33, regarded as a little long in the tooth on Tyneside, as well as being a little less comfortable outside of his penalty area than Eddie Howe might like.
City could be betting that the lure of signing Trafford will persuade them to part ways with Livramento, even if it’s otherwise against their will. The report doesn’t suggest a price point for such a trade – it simply claims that inside sources believe it’s one of the options on the table as City push forward with their efforts to prise Livramento away.
Trafford, for his part, may well be keen to go to a club where he would (presumably) be able to establish himself as the number one, but has been diplomatic enough not to make any complaints he has about his situation public. Pep Guardiola used a recent pre-match press conference to tell the media that he had been very “impressed” by his back-up, but there are no hints that he’s been impressed enough to pick him over Donnarumma.
Will Man City be able to sign Tino Livramento next summer?
It’s highly unlikely that any such deal would take place in January – there is little to no chance that Newcastle would be prepared to sell Livramento mid-season, and with Aaron Ramsdale at the club on loan, they have no need for another goalkeeper.
The summer may be another matter. At that stage, Livramento will have two years’ left on his contract, typically a point at which a club will either work to extend a player’s deal or sell him to maximise their transfer value. If the full-back decides not to extend his stay at St. James’ Park, it could well encourage Newcastle to consider such a deal.
Swap deals are highly unusual, of course, and any such agreement would surely involve two separate transfer fees to help both teams involved to navigate the Premier League’s financial rules. Newcastle have gone down that road before – not that their experience of selling Elliot Anderson and signing Odysseas Vlachodimos in return is likely to encourage them to try such a move again.
In this case, at least, they would be getting a goalkeeper they demonstrably want to sign – but they are still unlikely to want to let Livramento leave if they can avoid it. Only if the defender makes it absolutely plain that he wants to move on is this a transfer that’s likely to happen given both Newcastle’s opinion of Livramento and the complexities involved in getting such a deal over the line.
Like most of the more ambitious transfer rumours, this is more than likely to prove unfeasible or simply false, and the tale is not as yet corroborated by any more reputable sources. Still, for once, it’s a story about a swap deal that actually makes a certain degree of logical sense – so maybe, just maybe, there’s a little grain of truth in this one. Just don’t bet on it.
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