EDDIE HOWE has warned of the risks involved in allowing key players to enter the final year of their contract, and admitted it will be an expensive process if Newcastle United are looking to replace senior players leaving for nothing next summer.

Newcastle have eight first-team players in the final 12 months of their current deal, and another six who have less than two years of their contract to run.

Some of those due to become free agents next summer are fringe performers, with the likes of John Ruddy and Mark Gillespie expected to leave at the end of the season without being too difficult to replace.

Others are more heavily involved with the first team though, and in Fabian Schar, Jamaal Lascelles, Dan Burn and Emil Krafth, Newcastle have four senior defenders who are all in the final year of their contract. At the other end of the pitch, Callum Wilson’s current deal is also due to expire next summer.

The five players currently face an uncertain future, and while sporting director Paul Mitchell has assumed control of contractual matters, there are not believed to have been any formal discussions that might result in a swift resolution.

The situation is far from ideal, with Howe admitting that contractual uncertainty can sometimes lead to mental distraction and a dip in performance levels.

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And if any of the players in question were to depart for nothing next summer, the Magpies boss has also spelled out just how costly and difficult it would be to replace them.

“If you go back to Joelinton’s situation, when his contract was getting to a delicate time, then there was a real determination to agree a new deal,” said Howe. “Losing players to free transfers is not something that we want to be doing, as a football club, for many different reasons.

“Probably the biggest is that it’s a distraction for the players. In my experience, I don’t think players tend to play well when they start running their contracts down into that last year. It becomes a very uncertain time for them.

“I think we want the players at their best, and we want to protect the asset value of the individual player as well. To replace any player that is in and around our squad is going to cost us a lot of money, so we’ve got to be very careful with those decisions.”

Howe and Mitchell have talked this week, drawing a line under the stand-off that had overshadowed everything else that had been happening at Newcastle in the last few weeks.

However, while Howe will have an input into contractual discussions, he admits he does not really know the exact state of talks with any of the players whose futures are up for debate.

“I’m slightly detached from that, so I can’t really give any details,” he said. “I think it’s something that’s always on the club’s mind, in the respect of making sure that we protect the long-term interests of the club with players’ contracts. We don’t want to get into difficult situations. That work is always ongoing.”