Newcastle to battle for Lille defender

Newcastle United are keeping close tabs on the progress of Lille centre-back Tiago Djalo and are ready to battle for his signature in 2024, 90min understands.

Djalo is a player that Newcastle are huge admirers and have been tracking him for over a year now.

However, the Portugal Under-21 international has been sidelined since early in the year with a serious knee injury, meaning he is yet to play this season. He is expected to make his return to action in the coming weeks and Newcastle have been monitoring his rehabilitation.

Djalo is due to be out-of-contract at the end of the season. Despite the injury, interest is sizeable in the versatile 23-year-old, who is capable of playing anywhere across the backline.

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Newcastle, though, realise they are not alone in their admiration of Djalo, who was included in Portugal's preliminary squad for last year's World Cup finals before being cut by Fernando Santos.

90min understands that Inter are keen to bring the player back to Italy. He had a short stint in Milan's youth setup after he left his first club Sporting, though did not make a senior appearance for the Rossoneri.

Juventus, Barcelona, Atletico Madrid, Borussia Dortmund and Bayer Leverkusen are all showing an interest in Djalo, who is understood to have made it clear to Lille that he is ready to leave the club in 2024.

Newcastle's last major move to sign a centre-back also saw them sign an in-demand player from Lille, beating Milan to Sven Botman for a fee just north of £32m.

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