No Stone Unturned

Few clubs in the Barclays Premier League have been as active so far this summer as Newcastle, and First-Team Coach Steve Stone believes that will give United a head start when the new season gets underway.

Yohan Cabaye, Demba Ba and Sylvain Marveaux will link up with their new team-mates when the squad returns for pre-season training on Monday, and all three will fly out to America next month.

That will give them time to bond with the rest of the players and become accustomed to Alan Pardew's style of play, and Stone admits the club was keen to do as much business as possible before the start of July.

"I think it's great that we've made some moves in the transfer market," he told nufc.co.uk. "I think it's important that you do it quite early and that's what we've done.

"We had the money from the sale of Andy Carroll in January so we knew we had that money and we've had our targets for some time now.

"We've been able to look since January and have our scouts out there. Graham Carr has done a great job with (Hatem) Ben Arfa and (Cheik) Tiote before that and we're starting to go down that road, that avenue.

"We're looking at 23, 24-year-old players who can bring a bit of pace to our team and I'm pleased with what we've brought in so far.

"We've got three players with quality, who we can build the team around over the next few years."

Speaking at the annual NUFC Heroes Golf Day at Ponteland Golf Club, Stone added: "Obviously we're hoping to get another couple of players in, but now we've got new players we can take to America right from the start of pre-season.

"When we start on Monday, we do all the testing and they get to meet everybody at the same sort of time. It's not like having new faces come in dribs and drabs, which can be difficult.

"Everybody will turn up on the first day of training and they're part of it. They get to come to America with us two weeks later and that's important because they'll get to spend some quality but intense time with coaches, staff and team-mates."