Inside the blockbuster Matfen Hall summit shaping the way forward for Newcastle United: CRAIG HOPE reveals the massive deal signed already… and what’s subsequent on the agenda together with the newest on transfers, Eddie Howe’s future and new stadium

Newcastle United’s owners, executives and head coach Eddie Howe will gather at Matfen Hall this week for their annual ‘off-site’ meeting, addressing all of the key issues around the club.

It is the start of a seismic few months for Newcastle after a disappointing Premier League campaign that has them 14th in the table, with questions over key players’ futures and a host of unresolved issues off the pitch. 

Last year, our chief football reporter Craig Hope was inside the country mansion as the delegation discussed new stadium plans. However, 14 months on and there has been no definite progress on that front.

So, what is on the agenda this time around? Here, Craig takes you through the five biggest talking points being discussed and brings you some big breaking news out of the Northumberland summit…

1. STAY OR GO (stadium)?

Top of the agenda, I am told, is Newcastle’s executive team on the ground learning from majority owners the Saudi Public Investment Fund what they intend to do with the stadium – either redevelop St James’ Park or build a new state-of-the-art arena.

This does not mean they leave Matfen Hall’s grand Morning Room and the club prepare an even grander announcement – here is the new stadium, everyone! Rather, it is more about the direction of travel.

If Yasir Al-Rumayyan, who is PIF governor and club chairman, indicates which way the ownership want to go – new stadium or develop St James’ – that gives chief executive David Hopkinson and his team clarity on the focus of their work. The other option, and this is far from ideal, is that they ask for more information and time before making a decision.

Last year, the summit was given a detailed presentation and shown a video of how a new 65,000-capacity stadium would look. The expectation then, inside the club, was that a new build on Leazes Park was about to be sanctioned. That PIF approval did not come, however.

Another year of feasibility studies and investigations have followed, and Hopkinson has even explored an alternative site to Leazes Park in recent weeks. He and chief operating officer Brad Miller now believe, at the very least, all of the information is available for the club to determine what avenue they will venture down.

Only then can true, tangible progress be made, even if big questions still need to be answered over who and how the project will be financed.

CRAIG HOPE’S VERDICT: Make a decision! We were told this was coming in ‘early 2025’. Well, it’s now mid-2026 and the delay has not helped the club from an optics or financial perspective. To announce a new stadium or an extra 8,000-10,000 seats at St James’ would signal ambition. Right now, to borrow a word Howe used last year, it feels like ‘limbo’.

The benefits from an announcement alone are huge, and the financial reward down the line is what will make the difference in bridging the gap to the top clubs. Don’t forget, it is the club’s stated ambition to be among the best in the world by 2030.

2. STAY OR GO (Howe)?

This, it should be stressed, is not a case of Howe making a plea for his job and PIF deciding there and then if he stays as head coach. It is far more nuanced than that.

Howe wants to remain and lead the rebuild, and Hopkinson and sporting director Ross Wilson share that desire. There is no indication that PIF and Al-Rumayyan think any differently, although this will always be something of an unknown.

Rather, this meeting is about reviewing the performance of the past season and looking at solutions to the issues that have made it a difficult campaign. Only after this open, in-person exploration will all sides have a better feel for what is best going forward. Even then, it could be a case of reviewing the situation again at the end of the season.

So, for now, there is doubt as to the identity of Newcastle’s head coach next season. The likelihood is it will be Howe, but this summit allows all parties to learn a little bit more about each other’s thinking, ambition and motivation. For Howe, it is both a chance to convince and be convinced.

CRAIG HOPE’S VERDICT: Howe staying is best for Newcastle. He should leave the meeting having been reassured over the club’s ambition and the mechanics of how they achieve their goals in the short and long term. Equally, he must prove to the hierarchy that he still has the energy and drive to deliver on that, and everything I’m told is that he is more determined than ever to get the team back on track next season.

He has earned the right to lead a summer rebuild, given he is the overriding reason why the club went on an accelerated journey from 19th to fourth, qualified for the Champions League (twice) and won a first domestic trophy in 70 years, all in less than four years of Saudi ownership.

He is an elite coach who deserves to be afforded one sticky season, especially given the mitigation of last summer’s transfer window, a failure in part because PIF allowed the club to enter into it without a sporting director or chief executive. Outgoing sporting director Paul Mitchell staying in post through June bordered on negligence by the ownership.

There was also the Alexander Isak saga, which disrupted preparations and led to panicked buys in the last week of the window when he was belatedly sold to Liverpool on deadline day.

3. TRAINING GROUND

As revealed by Newcastle Confidential in January, the club are set to announce a new £200million training ground on land at Woolsington, near Newcastle Airport. This meeting should finalise the details of how those plans will look, with the financing of the project confirmed.

Once everything is signed off by PIF, the club can push ahead with paperwork and prepare for how the biggest announcement of the Saudi ownership to date will look.

CRAIG HOPE’S VERDICT: This, perhaps even more so than the stadium, is important in sending a message to players, agents and rival clubs. The training ground, after all, is where players spend the majority of their existence.

At present, Newcastle’s facility is too cramped, with too much of it outdated, and does not have the same ‘wow factor’ of others. It ranks among the bottom third, if not worse, in the Premier League, despite efforts to improve it over the past four years.

We talk a lot about optics in football, and plans for a new training ground are the quickest way to signal ambition and confirm the ownership’s commitment. Ahead of a busy summer window when prospective signings will be a looking for a reason to join (in the absence of Champions League football), being able to point to drawings of a state-of-the-art training ground would be most helpful, even if it would be at least two years from completion.

4. REVENUE GROWTH

This is Hopkinson’s first off-site summit and he will present to PIF a progress report of everything he has done since arriving in the autumn, which is a lot. Crucially, though, it is commercial growth that is his key remit. He has already made inroads and, just this month, a training-ground partnership with KNOX Hydration was announced, worth £18m over three years.

And here is the big breaking news out of Matfen Hall that we can bring you… a lucrative agreement thought to be worth more than £10m has been agreed with French food giant Sodexo. A new long-term deal for the provision of food and drink at St James’ Park has been agreed, in what will be a boost to the club’s revenue streams. 

This agreement was brokered between Hopkinson and Sodexo CEO Thierry Delaporte, who won the account after beating competition from three other global bidders.

The partnership will see St James’ positioned as Sodexo’s ‘Global Showcase Account’, with the French company deploying their latest technology and enhanced offerings to elevate the guest experience inside the stadium. Only the finest Bovril and mince pies will suffice for the good folk of Tyneside!

CRAIG HOPE’S VERDICT: Hopkinson has done a lot of talking since he arrived and that was needed – a front-of-house presence to engage with the outside world, especially given owners who exist in the background. The Canadian is dynamic and carries C-suite cache, but he also has to deliver.

Of late, with KNOX and now Sodexo, we’re seeing his commercial background bring important deals to the club’s portfolio, building on what were encouraging numbers in the latest annual accounts of a 44 per cent increase to £121m in commercial income.

Hopkinson knows that such deals are the quickest way to push back on the parameters of the Premier League’s and UEFA’s financial rules and help performance on the pitch. He believes he can add £100m to the above figure. Now for the next deal…

5. RECRUITMENT

Like Hopkinson, this is Wilson’s first ‘Saudi summit’ since his arrival in September. He, and others including Howe, will detail what has happened with regards recruitment in the past 12 months. The largely misspent £250m of last summer must be addressed.

But, beyond that, it is about identifying a strategy for this summer and learning what the ownership are willing to support. There is no definite ‘budget’, and we already know some star players will have to be sold to unlock spending from a financial-rules perspective. But the message from the hierarchy is likely to be one of instructing those on the ground to find a way to spend to the maximum within the rules.

The model for incomings, though, is about to change, and Wilson will present on how identifying value in the market is the strategy they will pursue, rather than proven players at a premium.

CRAIG HOPE’S VERDICT: Howe is on the record saying that clubs live and die by their recruitment, and this summer needs to be better than the last one. At least one of Nick Woltemade or Yoane Wissa could be sold and specifics are likely to be discussed in the coming days.

It is absolutely key that the club have a plan of who is going and who are their top targets, and go about enacting those plans as soon as the window opens. There cannot be a repeat of the trauma of Isak and all of the mistakes that arose from it.