With Saudi spending restricted and a glut of departures and arrivals the stakes are high for Eddie Howe, and his captain, amid uncertain times on Tyneside

Is it the end of the road for Bruno Guimarães and Newcastle or are they destined to share at least one more adventure?

With Arsenal anxious to add Eddie Howe’s Brazil midfielder to their armoury and Guimarães receptive to such advances, it remains hard to predict whether Newcastle’s intransigent resistance will be broken.

• Switzerland international poised to sign from Freiburg

• Guimarães wants to leave and is target for Arsenal

Newcastle have agreed a £51.5m deal with Freiburg that should see the versatile Switzerland midfielder Johan Manzambi swap the Bundesliga for the Premier League.

The 20-year-old, who has shone during this summer’s World Cup, is expected to sign a long-term contract at St James’ Park but the transfer will not be finalised while Switzerland remain in the World Cup. Manzambi, who has been widely coveted this summer, is struggling with a minor knee injury and Murat Yakin, Switzerland’s head coach, is unsure as to whether he will recover in time for the quarter-final against Argentina on Sunday.

• Howe rebuilding side after Tonali and Gordon exits

• Widely hyped as Amsterdam club’s next De Jong

Newcastle are close to completing the signing of Sean Steur from Ajax for about £23m. The two-footed central midfielder is only 18 but has been widely hyped as the Amsterdam club’s brightest emerging midfield talent since Frenkie de Jong.

While De Jong left for Barcelona in 2019, Steur, who can operate as a No 6 or a No 8, seems almost certainly Tyneside bound. At St James’ Park he is likely to start next season competing with Lewis Miley to fill Sandro Tonali’s old central midfield role and will be given time to adjust to the Premier League’s physicality.

• Club record signing wowed by Roberto De Zerbi’s plans

• Wages could rise to £275,000-a-week over six-year deal

Sandro Tonali has completed a record-breaking transfer to Tottenham from Newcastle for an initial £92.5m, the Italian claiming he was powerless to resist Roberto De Zerbi’s “magic” sales pitch.

“I spoke to the head coach [De Zerbi] for close to two hours about the club, the fans, the stadium and our football. It was like magic because I knew immediately I had to sign for Tottenham. I can’t wait to start the season,” said Tonali, whose fee could potentially rise to £100m should Spurs achieve serial Champions League qualifications, something that would also see the midfielder’s wages rise to around £275,000-a-week over a six-year contract.

• Côte d’Ivoire international is second summer arrival

• ‘I am very excited to play at St James’ Park,’ he says

Bazoumana Touré has completed a £43m move to Newcastle from Hoffenheim. The 20-year-old Côte d’Ivoire winger is Eddie Howe’s second signing of the summer after the former Reims goalkeeper Ewen Jaouen.

While Jaouen is expected to start the season as the club’s second-choice keeper, Touré seems destined to fill the boots vacated by Anthony Gordon when the England winger departed for Barcelona in May.

• Chelsea and Manchester United also interested in winger

• Real Madrid issue statement denying Fernández contact

Fulham have joined the race to sign Crysencio Summerville from West Ham. The winger is expected to move this summer and is attracting interest from a host of Premier League clubs.

Chelsea and Manchester United have been monitoring Summerville, who is likely to leave West Ham following their relegation from the Premier League, but it remains to be seen whether the Netherlands international earns a move to one of the top flight’s leading sides.

• ‘It was always going to be Everton,’ says Hackney

• Spurs seal £85m deal for Fernandes from West Ham

Everton have completed the signing of Hayden Hackney from Middlesbrough in a deal that could rise to £25m, while Tottenham have confirmed the arrival of Mateus Fernandes from West Ham for £85m.

The midfielder Hackney, named player of the year in the Championship last season, has signed a five-year contract with the Merseyside club after weeks of negotiations over the fee.

Some Newcastle fans are pleased to cash in, but the winger’s pedigree in the Champions League is unquestionable

José Mourinho was a man on a mission. Once the final whistle blew, he made a beeline for Anthony Gordon and not only embraced the England winger, but whispered four words in his ear. “You are too much,” was the message from Benfica’s manager after his side lost a Champions League match 3-0 at Newcastle last October.

Gordon had scored one goal, created another and terrorised Benfica’s defence in the course of the sort of performance that explains why Barcelona are paying £70m for his turbo-charged talent.

• England winger flying out for medical on Thursday

• Gordon could double wages to around £300,000 a week

Anthony Gordon is due to undergo a medical in Barcelona on Thursday after the La Liga winners agreed a £69.3m transfer with Newcastle on Wednesday night. Should everything proceed to plan the England winger is set to double his wages to around £300,000 a week.

Bayern Munich had been favourites to sign the England winger and even saw a late bid rejected on Wednesday but Gordon’s heart was set on Barcelona and a new life at the Camp Nou. Accordingly a player who also interested Liverpool swiftly agreed personal terms before Newcastle and the Catalan club entered more protracted negotiations regarding the structure of the fee.

Saints’ self-destruction has left Kim Hellberg and Sergej Jakirovic tantalisingly close to fulfilling their dream in Saturday’s Wembley trip

When the television cameras zoomed in for a closeup it became clear Hayden Hackney was crying.

Middlesbrough’s best player had just watched his teammates lose the second leg of the Championship playoff semi-final 2-1 in extra time at Southampton. As he left his seat behind the away dugout and wandered across the pitch, the Redcar-born midfield playmaker looked utterly heartbroken.

• Saints believe penalty is ‘manifestly disproportionate’

• Hull and Middlesbrough will meet in final on Saturday

Southampton’s appeal against their expulsion from the Championship playoff final for spying on opponents’ training sessions has been dismissed by an English Football League arbitration panel, leaving Middlesbrough to contest Saturday’s Wembley showpiece with Hull. The panel also confirmed the original decision of an independent disciplinary commission to deduct four Championship points from Southampton next season.

It is a verdict that leaves the position of Tonda Eckert, the south coast club’s manager, seemingly untenable. While the 33-year-old German faces the sack, Southampton directors are facing the wrath of players furious at missing out on potential promotion bonuses and wage hikes.

• Club admit breaches but are confident over appeal

• Boro reinstated to take on Hull in Saturday’s final

Southampton could face a legal claim from their players for loss of earnings after the club were expelled from the Championship playoff final for spying on training sessions staged by Middlesbrough and two other second-tier rivals.

The squad have been discussing their options after Boro, semi-final losers to Tonda Eckert’s side, were reinstated to Saturday’s Wembley showpiece against Hull City. It is understood there is widespread fury in Southampton’s dressing room, presenting Eckert and the board with another headache after a fraught period.

It was a decision that threatens to keep Nuno Espírito Santo awake for many nights to come. Why, oh why, West Ham’s manager will doubtless wonder, did he opt to start with a back three on Tyneside?

Instead of subduing Eddie Howe’s players it simply served to remind Nick Woltemade precisely why he is Newcastle’s record signing. By the 26th minute, when Nuno scrapped that configuration for a much more effective back four, West Ham were 2-0 down and had one foot in the Championship.

Régis Le Bris’s tricky midfielder on the joy he finds in playmaking and the Black Cats’ push for European football

Enzo Le Fée has been chatting for 25 minutes when it becomes clear that his ability to extract rabbits from hats is not confined to the pitch.

“I’m a magician,” says Sunderland’s French playmaker as the conversation drifts to life off the field. “Yes, really! I can do some magic, tricks with the cards, that sort of thing. I used to practise a lot when I was young so I got really good. I still sometimes like to do my tricks but I’m a bit shy about performing them now.”

• ‘It’s unfair, they saw everything’, says Boro manager

• Southampton’s Eckert walks out after questioning

Southampton’s manager, Tonda Eckert, walked out of the post-match press conference at Middlesbrough on Saturday after repeatedly refusing to answer questions about allegations that one of his analysts had spied on Kim Hellberg’s training session last Thursday.

Shortly afterwards Hellberg said his Middlesbrough team were victims of “cheating” in the lead-up to this vital Championship playoff semi-final first leg.

The German has twice come close to the sack but has led team towards safety and first FA Cup semi since 1987

The crate was crammed with bottles but Daniel Farke made light work of hoisting it on to a table and inviting everyone to help themselves. It was a little after 10.30 one night in April last year, an already-promoted Leeds had just beaten Bristol City, and the manager was offering journalists an end-of-season beer.

Such gestures are increasingly unusual in an ever-more corporate and sanitised sport, but Farke brings a human touch to proceedings. Indeed, his refreshingly down-to-earth approach is reminiscent of an illustrious title-winning predecessor. Behind a blunt exterior Howard Wilkinson was a caring manager who, spotting a journalist stranded outside Elland Road late one night, drove him home to Sheffield. It seems the sort of thing Farke might also do.

Vítor Pereira had promised ­Nottingham Forest would approach this assignment with a “Champions League mentality” and his players did not disappoint him.

A fabulous attacking performance featuring four different scorers (plus an own goal) and a clean sheet not merely succeeded in denting a shell-shocked Sunderland’s European ambitions but also lifted 16th-placed Forest to 39 points.

Is this the moment a rough patch turns into a full blown crisis for Eddie Howe? As Alex Scott shone in Bournemouth’s midfield and Adrien Truffert’s late winner prompted wild visiting celebrations, it certainly looked that way.

Newcastle’s manager has now presided over four straight defeats and, with his team stuck in 14th, any vision of European qualification seems a fast receding speck in the distance.

• 1-0 defeat at Sunderland leaves Tottenham in bottom three

• ‘Win a game, everything will be different,’ De Zerbi says

Roberto De Zerbi diagnosed a lack of confidence as the root cause of Tottenham’s ills after his first match as manager ended in a 1-0 defeat at Sunderland. The result leaves Spurs in the relegation zone, two points adrift of 17th with six games remaining.

“We didn’t deserve to lose,” said De Zerbi after a match decided by Nordi Mukiele’s deflected second-half winner. “We played a good game, but maybe not good enough to win.

Thirty minutes before kick-off Roberto De Zerbi wandered on to the pitch with his gilet zipped high to the neck in the face of a chill Wearside wind. By the final whistle that stiff breeze had dropped a little but so, too, had the morale of Tottenham and their new manager.

In cementing the visitors’ position in the bottom three Nordi Mukiele’s second-half deflected winner ensured Régis Le Bris’s Sunderland rose to 10th and De Zerbi’s uncharacteristically subdued body language suggested he was shivering inside.