Wise Offers Taylor Role As Newcastle Academy Head

Peter Taylor is being lined up as the next director of Newcastle United's academy. The former England caretaker manager and Under-21 coach, who left Stevenage Borough two weeks ago, had a meeting with Dennis Wise, the club's executive director (football), at a hotel in Waltham Abbey to discuss the possibility on Wednesday and is tempted by the potential challenge.

"Dennis rang me for a general chat a couple of weeks ago and then we had a cup of coffee and another talk yesterday," said Taylor, who briefly served as Wise's manager at Leicester City, last night. It is understood Taylor is one of four candidates being considered by Newcastle to oversee the academy but he is by some distance the most experienced and high-profile.

Although youth development is part of Wises' rather than Kevin Keegan's remit at the club, Taylor enjoys a good relationship with the one-time England coach and could conceivably help improve recently strained relations between Newcastle's manager and executive director.

With Newcastle's wages as percentage of turnover ratio approaching an unhealthy 80% - the consensus is that 50% is about right - Mike Ashley, the owner, and Chris Mort, the chairman, are anxious to develop the club's youth system. Producing young players is a field in which Taylor, 55, excels and it is also felt that his impressive reputation could persuade parents to send their sons to Newcastle's academy rather than a rival club.

However Taylor, widely acclaimed as an outstanding coach and almost universally liked by his former England Under-21 players, would also be working with youngsters from around the world as Wise and his scouting team aim to emulate Arsenal's example and are currently scouring the globe for bright but as yet unheralded young talent for Newcastle's staff to polish.

Should Taylor accept an offer from Newcastle - and, attractive as Wise's blueprint undoubtedly is, he could yet be tempted by the possibility of a return to front line management - it remains to be seen if Joe Joyce, Newcastle's current academy manager, will stay at the club.

Joyce succeeded Glenn Roeder in the role when the latter was promoted to first-team manager following Graeme Souness' sacking and it appears Ashley is interested in having another well known name heading up his youth development program. Similarly the future of Steve Round, Keegan's out-of-contract first-team coach, is still uncertain; the former Middlesbrough assistant manager is waiting to hear if he will be offered a new deal.

Meanwhile Charles N'Zogbia, Newcastle's France Under-21 midfielder, has denied that he is desperate to leave the club. "I am happy at Newcastle and I always have been but like the other Newcastle players I will be looking at who the club signs this summer," said N'Zogbia, who insists that reports of him having a scuffle with his team-mate Abdoulaye Faye over their respective salaries are "untrue". N'Zogbia, who has been linked with a summer move to Spurs, added: "Apart from being my friend, Abdoulaye is a little bit bigger than me."

Yet despite this unexpected pledge of loyalty, the left-sided Frenchman may not be on Tyneside come August. Indeed, with Keegan's summer transfer kitty reported to be a relatively modest £20m, the manager, who hopes to recruit some established Premier League luminaries, could be tempted to wheel and deal and the talented N'Zogbia could well leave St James' if Newcastle receive an enticing bid.