Kieran Maguire: Premier League on ‘thin ice’ after source’s £47m Newcastle reveal
The Premier League would be ‘skating on thin ice’ if it allowed Newcastle United to loan Ruben Neves from PIF-backed Al Hilal.
That is the view of finance expert Kieran Maguire, who spoke exclusively to Football Insider about Newcastle’s links to the 26-year-old.
As revealed by Football Insider on 21 June, Newcastle have discussed signing Ruben Neves on loan from Al Hilal this summer.
Neves only made the switch from Wolves to Saudi Arabi this summer, with Al Hilal paying £47million for the 26-year-old star.
The Saudi Arabian Public Investment Fund, which owns a majority stake in Newcastle United, purchased a 75 per cent stake in Al Hilal earlier this summer.
The links between Saudi Arabian clubs and Premier League stars has caused uproar among football fans, with Gary Neville in particular demanding that the Premier League investigates the transfers further.
Maguire believes that the Premier League will investigate the transfer as it is part of their official handbook to assess the fair market value of deals.
“If you take a look at the Premier League handbook, it’s thick, weighty and not particularly exciting,” Maguire told Football Insider’s Sean Fisher.
“But there is a section which specifically deals with football transfers and loans in terms of fair market value transactions.
“So, I think that the Premier League would be encouraged by other clubs and certainly by the media to investigate if such an arrangement did take place.
“It would be skating on thin ice as far as many people are concerned in terms of the integrity and the transparency of individual transfer transactions.
“You would expect it to draw a lot of attention, and not just from media and social media.
“I think that the Premier League would be very interested to investigate further.“
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