8. Pay For Three Players Who'll Probably Take Anything At This Point
Chris Radburn/PA Wire/Press Association ImagesQuality is all well and good, but when Newcastle inevitably embark on that cup run they've been promising for all those years, they're going to need a deep squad to do it. That and they're still waiting for Leon Best and James Perch to actually be replaced. Thankfully, the waste-pipes of the Premier League are loaded with outgoing talent this year. The big club's are letting any defender born before 1982 leave on a free, and everyone else is dispensing of any player who seemed promising in 2008 but hasn't quite come on since. You could pick any three of this pile in truth, but I'm going for players who I do vaguely remember touting for greatness in a pub at some point, and Marc Albrighton, Jack Collison and, bizarrely, Anthony Pilkington would be my picks. Why these three you ask? Well, for starters, they all look like early millennial US drama heartthrobs who have been sorely let down by their casting agent in the years since, but mostly because at this stage of their careers (they're all between 24-26) they've not only proven themselves at this level, but could conceivably kick on as those "late bloomers" you never seem to hear about. Albrighton is still an able and unpredictable wide player that might just iron out his inconsistencies with the motivation of a new challenge; Collison wrote a 3,000 word open letter to West Ham fans and thus makes him the most articulate footballer of the last three decades; and Anthony Pilktington once scored a winner against Man United after Fergie claimed he'd never heard of him.