Anthony Gordon to undergo medical at Barça before £69.3m move from Newcastle

Anthony Gordon is due to undergo a medical in Barcelona on Thursday after the La Liga winners agreed a £69.3m transfer with Newcastle on Wednesday night. Should everything proceed to plan the England winger is set to double his wages to around £300,000 a week.

Bayern Munich had been favourites to sign the England winger and even saw a late bid rejected on Wednesday but Gordon’s heart was set on Barcelona and a new life at the Camp Nou. Accordingly a player who also interested Liverpool swiftly agreed personal terms before Newcastle and the Catalan club entered more protracted negotiations regarding the structure of the fee.

All parties will be delighted to have finalised the deal before Monday when Gordon is scheduled to fly to Florida to join Thomas Tuchel’s England squad ahead of the World Cup.

Although the transfer window does not open until 15 June, the intention is to complete all the formalities of the transfer by the weekend and then rubber-stamp the move in the middle of next month.

Barcelona are set to acquire a versatile forward capable of playing right across the front line. Although Gordon’s best position is almost certainly wide on the left, he is the joint-third leading scorer in this season’s Champions League after registering 10 goals. Only Harry Kane and Kylian Mbappé have scored more in Europe’s showpiece club competition.

Yet while Gordon – who has sometimes been reluctant to operate on the right – ended the season as Newcastle’s top scorer in all competitions with 17 goals, he tended to reserve his best performances for Europe and proved inconsistent during a largely underwhelming Premier League campaign that frequently saw him operate at centre-forward.

The 25-year-old’s versatility appeals to Barcelona’s manager, Hansi Flick, who seems unlikely to make Marcus Rashford’s loan move from Manchester United permanent. Gordon will, however, face competition from Lamine Yamal and Raphinha on the flanks at the Camp Nou. Flick, meanwhile, still retains the option of signing Rashford – whose wages are understood to be considerably higher than the sum Gordon has accepted – on a permanent basis for £26m.

While David Hopkinson, Newcastle’s chief executive, has consistently said the club will only sell “on our terms”, he knows he needs to trade in order to reconstruct Eddie Howe’s side in the wake of this season’s disappointing 12th-placed league finish.

Howe was anxious to avoid a repeat of last year’s long-running, increasingly acrimonious Alexander Isak transfer saga that only concluded when the Sweden striker moved to Liverpool on last summer’s transfer deadline day.

Coincidentally, Liverpool came close to signing Gordon in 2024 and the former Everton forward has admitted he became “unsettled for a while” when that move foundered.

In recent weeks it has become evident that a transfer this summer was in both his and Newcastle’s interests. The winger – whose contract on Tyneside runs to 2030 – was not involved in the final six games of the season for Howe’s team, initially with what was described as a “minor hip injury” before being an unused substitute in the closing four fixtures.