The bold £50m Newcastle & Nottingham Forest swap transfer deal that could be perfect for both teams - opinion

Newcastle United have made little secret of their interest in Anthony Elanga over the past year or so. A £35m offer was turned down by Nottingham Forest last summer, and the Magpies have tracked him ever since – with the Sweden international close to the top of the club’s shortlist as they search for a new winger this summer.

Now, a new report from TeamTalk cites anonymous sources in claiming that Newcastle could be prepared to lower the cost of a potential deal by including a makeweight: Harvey Barnes. So how plausible is a potential big-money swap deal between the two sides, and would it make sense for both parties involved?

Newcastle United & Nottingham Forest could make a trade for Anthony Elanga

The two teams involved have previous when it comes to ‘swap’ deals – last summer, Newcastle and Forest traded Elliot Anderson and goalkeeper Odysseas Vlachodimos for significant fees, partly in order to avoid falling afoul of the Premier League’s profit and sustainability rules.

The Premier League warned both clubs about the deal amid concerns that the prices involved did not reflect fair valuations of the players involved, but a similar deal for Elanga and Barnes is unlikely to raise such concerns unless the fees are wildly inflated.

TeamTalk’s report claims that Nottingham Forest value Elanga at £50m, which would appear to be consistent with their negotiations nearly a year ago. It’s less clear how much Newcastle see Barnes as being worth, but with his persistent injury issues it’s likely that any deal would see Forest receiving a considerable cash sum alongside the former Leicester City winger.

The two teams’ prior dealings sets a precedent which makes a player-plus-cash deal eminently plausible, but finding an agreement over the value of both Elanga and Barnes will prove more challenging, and would be the single largest barrier towards a deal taking place.

That’s particularly true in the case of Barnes. Although his contributions, when available for selection, have mostly been impressive for several seasons now, concerns over his consistency and fitness mean that there is a significant gap between how good he can be and how impactful he sometimes is in practice. That, in turn, will affect both team’s valuations and could lead to a gap that’s too large to surmount.

The other hurdle to clear is that Forest are not thought to be particularly keen on selling Elanga, particularly with Morgan Gibbs-White’s future also up in the air amid alleged interest from teams including Manchester City. With a first European campaign of the century in the offing, Nuno Espirito Santo will not wish to lose too many of his most influential players at the same time.

Elanga is under contract until 2028 and Forest are, for the first time in a while, not believed to be under any immediate financial pressure due to the profit and sustainability rules. As a result, there is no economic need to sell Elanga, and they will only do so if they are presented with very generous terms.

Newcastle, for their part, are believed to be much closer to the line for the 2024/25 season with regards to PSR, and although not expected to be in breach this season, their spending may be more heavily restricted. That makes a ‘swap’ deal the perfect scenario for them, but also means that they may be unwilling to meet Forest’s cash demands in a deal.

Why a swap deal could potentially benefit all parties

Newcastle are long-standing admirers of Elanga, and the 23-year-old seems to be a natural fit for Eddie Howe’s system, offering the combination of dribbling skills, speed, threat and directness that fits tactics which prioritise getting the ball forward at pace.

While Elanga is not a particularly regular goalscorer, with 11 Premier League strikes in the past two seasons since moving to the City Ground from Manchester United, he has contributed 20 assists in that time and his capacity to carve out space with his movement and willingness to take defenders on fits the way Howe wants his side to attack very neatly.

Perhaps most importantly of all, signing Elanga would give Newcastle the right winger that they’ve wanted since Miguel Almirón’s form began to tail off prior to his eventual departure in January. Jacob Murphy has filled the void remarkably effectively, but the need for another player who can play the role effectively is evident.

Elanga is also comfortable playing as an inverted winger on the left-hand side, as well, which means that he can also fill Barnes’ shoes as Anthony Gordon’s back-up. Newcastle are also in the market for Brighton & Hove Albion’s João Pedro and while he may be earmarked for the right-sided role too, a move which saw Barnes depart and Elanga arrive would create more opportunities for the Brazilian to play either on the left or through the middle, his more natural positions.

The real question, then, is whether Barnes would offer a suitable replacement for Elanga. That’s a trickier discussion, both in terms of Forest’s needs and his production over recent seasons.

A naturally left-sided player, Barnes can operate on the right but would arguably be less of a replacement for Elanga than competition for Calum Hudson-Odoi, who has typically operated on the left flank under Santo. While Forest need some depth on the wings, then, Barnes may not be seen as a starter so much as a rotational option, which may affect Forest’s valuation of him and impact the desirability of the deal.

Concerns over Barnes’ fitness won’t make him any more appealing, although having started just seven league matches during his first season at St. James’ Park, he was a more regular presence in 2024/25, with 33 appearances and 17 starts.

What Barnes does offer is more of a goal threat than Elanga. Over the past five seasons, Barnes has scored 42 league goals at just 31.2xG, a highly impressive scoring rate in terms of both goals per minute and compared to the chances he’s had. Most strikers would be very happy with those numbers.

He’s less of a creator than Elanga, perhaps, although on a minute-by-minute basis the seven top-flight assists he’s managed for Newcastle haven’t arrived at all that much slower of a rate than Elanga’s 20, but Forest also need to diversify their goalscoring threat with so many more matches on the immediate horizon following their qualification for the Europa Conference League.

With Chris Wood also liable to slow down at some stage as the years advance, signing a player who can add a healthy volume of goals to the attack makes a great deal of sense – if they judge that the worst of Barnes’ fitness problems are behind him, then he would certainly add some of the finishing prowess that they need.

This isn’t an easy deal to get done, but there are potential upsides for both parties. Newcastle would exchange a player who isn’t always as available as they’d like for a regular starter who fits their gameplan, while Forest would get a versatile goal threat and some cash to reinvest elsewhere – while both teams would get a little more PSR leeway should they need it. The finances will be hard to hash out, and Forest would be taking a gamble on Barnes’ fitness, but this is still a deal that could get done and prove beneficial for all parties involved.