The James Trafford saga may be coming to a disappointing end for Newcastle United.
For around a year now, Newcastle United have attempted to sign Trafford from Burnley.
Indeed, Trafford wants to join Newcastle, and the club saw a bid rejected by the Clarets before transfer talks continued.
Now, however, yet another complication has emerged. Manchester City are interested in Trafford and boast a buy-back clause in the goalkeeper’s contract after selling him to Burnley in 2023.
While Nick Pope is a fine goalkeeper to go into the season with as a No.1, the optics of missing out on Trafford wouldn’t be great. They’ve tracked him for what feels like an age, and watching him go elsewhere would add further frustration to what has already been a disappointing summer transfer window.
Such has been the protracted nature of the saga, it seems Trafford has been convinced he’s set to join Newcastle for a while now.
Photo by Molly Darlington/Getty ImagesJames Trafford telling people he was going to join Newcastle United
After news of City’s interest in the custodian emerged, Luke Edwards of The Daily Telegraph was asked about the situation.
Edwards had revealed on social media platform X that Newcastle were refusing to go up to £40million for Trafford, the fee that Burnley were demanding.
He then added that Trafford “thought” he was “definitely” going to move to St James’ Park this summer.
When asked about the situation by a supporter, Edwards revealed that Trafford was “telling everyone he met” that he was joining Newcastle.
Well given the player was telling everyone he met he was joining Newcastle this summer…
— Luke Edwards (@LukeEdwardsTele) July 19, 2025
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Eddie Howe will be fuming about James Trafford news
Newcastle fans think Eddie Howe is frustrated about the lack of transfers at the club this summer after watching a recent club interview.
Clearly, it’s difficult to know exactly what the Newcastle United manager actually thinks, though it hardly takes a great leap of imagination to suggest he’d be angry to see Trafford head elsewhere.
It’s been such a long saga and for it not to end positively is another bitter blow. Newcastle have already seen moves for Joao Pedro, Liam Delap, Bryan Mbeumo and Hugo Ekitike fail this summer.
Howe wanted Newcastle to make two signings by the start of pre-season, and they’ve only managed to do half of that following the addition of Anthony Elanga.
Things need to start picking up quickly.