Dan Burn described the summer around Alexander Isak\u2019s departure as draining but offered a conciliatory tone after Newcastle accepted a British-record fee. The club secured top-tier European football and, having pushed back initially on any sale, belatedly agreed to bank \u00a3130 million ($175.6 million) for the 25-year-old.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m glad it\u2019s done,\u201d Burn said, reflecting on a period the squad wanted to close quickly. \u201cWe wanted the transfer window to close just to have clarity,\u201d he told assembled media ahead of England\u2019s World Cup qualifier against Andorra.<\/p>\n
Burn acknowledged the personal ambitions that drive players. \u201cI\u2019ve been in football long enough to understand that for a player the career is short and they have things they want to achieve. I\u2019m happy it\u2019s over. Alex is a mate and it\u2019s a tough situation as you want him around to help the team. But [I] also understand for him what he needs to do personally. I\u2019ve got nothing but good wishes for Alex.\u201d<\/p>\n
There were accusations that Isak\u2019s displeasure affected the finale of last season, with suggestions he behaved like a player who did not want the Magpies to qualify for the Champions League. Supporters reacted loudly on the terraces and some branded the striker a \u201crat\u201d during matches.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s no animosity,\u201d Burn insisted. \u201cAs a Newcastle fan myself, you know what Newcastle fans are like; we\u2019re protective of our club and city and you want players who want to be there for Newcastle and don\u2019t want to naively think there is anywhere else to go apart from playing for Newcastle. I understand why our fans were frustrated. I\u2019ve been in the game long enough to know what goes on and wish him all the best, apart from when we play Liverpool .\u201d<\/p>\n
Burn also revealed a simple farewell from Isak to his former teammates. \u201cHe put a message in the chat just saying that he was leaving, and thanks for the memories, all that sort of stuff, and the lads replied,\u201d the England international revealed.<\/p>\n
Admitting the saga dimmed some of last season\u2019s positivity, Burn said: \u201cI think it can be frustrating at times. Everything was so positive last season, so that took a little bit of a shine off. But I\u2019m not silly, I\u2019ve been around football a long time now, and people have short careers, and they want to max out absolutely everything they can, so there\u2019s no hard feelings from me. I think we\u2019ve got two good players in that position now, which will hopefully fill up the goals that we\u2019ve lost.\u201d<\/p>\n
Newcastle signed young German forward Nick Woltemade for a club-record \u00a365 million and added Yoane Wissa as reinforcements to replace Isak.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Dan Burn wished Alexander Isak well after a fractious exit; Newcastle banked a British-record \u00a3130m.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2539,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[194,172],"tags":[195,933],"class_list":["post-2540","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newcastle-united","category-epl","tag-alexander-isak","tag-dan-burn"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2540","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2540"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2540\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2539"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2540"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2540"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2540"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}