It’s been a typically circuitous route, but all reports say Mike Ashley’s latest deal to sell Newcastle United has all but crossed the finish line. As Sky Sports reports, the contracts have been drawn and signed, the deposit has been deposited, the i’s dotted and t’s crossed. All that’s keeping PCP Capital Partners from acquiring the club from Ashley is the Premier League subjecting the new ownership group to its acquiescent owners’ and directors’ test. That means we’re probably mere days away from Newcastle going from an infamously mismanaged club, with no realistic hopes of success, owned by a blundering idiot, to being impossibly rich, having better future prospects than ever before, owned by murderers.

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