Premier League outfit Newcastle United were reportedly outbid by just £2million for Borussia Monchengladbach’s new signing Alassane Plea.
After the tepid goalless draw with Cardiff City which shone a light on Newcastle’s lack of cutting edge in attack, it seems rather pertinent to draw attention to Alassane Plea’s dream debut over in Germany.
According to The Chronicle, Plea had picked Newcastle as the club he wanted to join when leaving Nice this summer with the prospect of working under Rafa Benitez understood to be a big draw for the Frenchman.
It was even claimed that The Magpies made a club-record £20 million. Soon after, however, Plea put pen to paper with another club in black and white – Bundesliga outfit Borussia Monchengladbach.
Die Folen outbid Newcastle by just £2 million, and Plea is already starting to repay that transfer fee, albeit against rather limited opposition.
The 25-year-old marked his competitive Gladbach bow in a remarkable 11-1 away win at lower league outfit BSC Hastedt in the first round of the DFP Pokal on Sunday. And Plea was one of three players, alongside Thorgan Hazard and Rafael, to score a hat-trick in the goal-laden rout.
So that is three in one game for Plea, who scored 35 goals in his last two seasons for Nice as well. In Cardiff, Newcastle obviously faced far more stubborn opposition this weekend but the reality is that there is no one in Benitez’s squad capable of sniffing out a goal quite like Plea.
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