NEWCASTLE UNITED will listen to offers for their club captain, Jamaal Lascelles, this summer, with Wolves and Nottingham Forest both harbouring a long-term interest in the centre-half.
Lascelles has made just one start and three substitute appearances in the Premier League this season, with the form displayed by Fabian Schar, Sven Botman and Dan Burn keeping him out of the first-team frame.
The 29-year-old, who has entered the final 18 months of his current contract on Tyneside, was the subject of interest in January, but Eddie Howe made it clear he did not want to lose the defender last month.
Ciaran Clark left on a season-long loan last summer, reducing Newcastle’s central-defensive options, and while Lascelles might have been a peripheral figure on the pitch in the first half of the season, he remains a hugely-influential figure within the Magpies’ dressing room.
Newcastle’s recruitment team are expected to bring in another defender once the transfer window reopens in the summer though, and that is likely to signal the end of Lascelles’ time in the North-East.
Having joined the Magpies in the summer of 2014, albeit spending the first season of his Newcastle career back on loan at Nottingham Forest, Lascelles has developed into a key figure at the club.
He was an integral member of the squad that won promotion back to the Premier League under Rafael Benitez, and helped hold things together during the turbulent period overseen by Steve Bruce.
He is unlikely to be short of suitors in the summer, with his former club, Forest, likely to be one the sides interested in securing his services provided they remain in the Premier League. Wolves are also regarded as likely potential bidders, with the Molineux club known to have scouted Lascelles in the past.
This summer is set to see something of a clear-out within the Newcastle squad, with Karl Darlow, Paul Dummett, Matt Ritchie and Ryan Fraser all expected to move on.
Dummett and Ritchie are due to become free agents at the end of the current campaign, and are not expected to be offered a new deal, while Darlow could complete a permanent move to Hull City once his current loan deal ends in the summer.
Fraser was close to leaving Tyneside last month, only for a couple of potential deadline-day deals to come to nothing, and has not started a league game for Newcastle since mid-September.
Jamal Lewis, whose Premier League involvement so far this season amounts to one substitute appearance, is another player who could well be deemed surplus to requirements.
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