Curious case of Isaac Hayden – Reappeared on Tuesday night | OneFootball

Isaac Hayden played for Newcastle United on Tuesday night.

No, honestly, he did.

However, it wasn’t at St James’ Park where Newcastle United dominated and won against AFC Wimbledon, though failed to really create enough nor finish more chances, to make the scoreline more comfortable. Though the visitors didn’t have a single shot on target, so once Fabian Schar slotted the penalty, the result was never in doubt.

Anyway, Isaac Hayden.

He was actually around 150 miles away from St James’ Park last night, Isaac Hayden playing for ‘Newcastle United’, the first time since 2021.

The midfielder turned out for the NUFC Under 21s in an away game at Halifax Town in the National League Cup.

Goals from Johnny Emerson and Ben Parkinson saw United run out 2-1 winners, Isaac Hayden playing around an hour before then replaced by Trevan Sanusi.

Isaac Hayden started in Premier League defeats against Liverpool and Man City in December 2021, weeks after Eddie Howe took over, but those were his last first team starts for United.

His only first team starts since then have been out on loan for Norwich City, Standard Liege and Queens Park Rangers.

Isaac Hayden hasn’t really done anything wrong, he has simply been a victim (if you can call somebody a victim who is getting paid tens of thousands of pounds a week to do nothing???) of the Mike Ashley regime and the change to a proper cub ran by ambitious owners.

Ashley refused to allow proper investment in the Newcastle United squad and especially as the Steve Bruce went on, we saw more and more ridiculous contracts handed out, paying players far more than their ability warranted, rather than paying more than that for players who were Premier League standard.

Thankfully, Isaac Hayden is pretty much last man standing in this respect, with those who weren’t of the now required standard, moved on, or in many/most cases seeing out their contracts to the very end.

Isaac Hayden was given a ridiculous new six year contract back in 2020, he still has almost 21 months left of it to go (current contract situation for all Newcastle United players below hopefully new extended Anthony Gordon deal announced officially very soon!).

No club is going to pay Isaac Hayden anything remotely close to what he still earns at Newcastle United (for not playing).

Hence why he is still at the club and training with the Newcastle United Under 21s.

Even though he wasn’t named in the Premier League senior squad for the first half of this season, Isaac Hayden could still have played for the first team last night in the Carabao Cup, if selected. This applies to the FA Cup as well of course.

Though not going to happen.

Even though outside of transfer windows currently, my understanding is that if player and club agreed to terminate his contract now, then Isaac Hayden becomes instantly a free agent and could sign for another club immediately.

So much of this though comes down to just how desperate an individual is when it comes to wanting to play football. How much of the cash they are entitled to for continuing to not play, are they willing to give up, in order to play football elsewhere?

We have all seen so many really bad examples over the years, including at Newcastle United. Just look at that tubby rat Ryan Fraser, what he did to Bournemouth and then Ashley and Bruce were daft enough to allow him to do the same to Newcastle United.

I have no idea what the other factors are surrounding Isaac Hayden, he was a decent servant for NUFC for a good few years and Rafa Benitez got a real tune out of him, plus he always came over as a decent bloke.

You see so many players as well these days who end up becoming out of contract but then don’t sign for another club the following season. What’s that all about?

Obviously a big difference these days is if you have played at a high level, you no longer necessarily have to keep playing just to put food on the table and pay the rent/mortgage.

You have say Paul Dummett, he only turned 33 in recent days and yet is still training at NUFC and not signed up elsewhere after getting released in June. Clearly he could still be doing a job for so many clubs below the top tier and yet isn’t playing for any of them. Surely getting a deal for a fraction of what you used to get AND playing football still, should be better than getting paid nothing and no football?

Are there tax issues or whatever, any reason why you wouldn’t be desperate to play in the small number of years you have left as good enough and young enough as a full-time pro?

You have some real stellar names who do the same. David de Gea was only 32 when becoming a free agent at the end of June 2023, yet he had an entire season without a club, he was often linked with NUFC as well as many others. He has just started playing again after signing for Fiorentina.

If anybody has any answers to these questions I have posed above, I would love to hear them.

How the Newcastle United contracts situation currently looks (via official club releases and media reports), when current deals end :

End of June 2025:

Dubravka, Schar, Wilson, Burn, Lascelles, Krafth, Gillespie, Ruddy, Lewis

End of June 2026:

Targett, Pope, Almiron, Longstaff, Ashby, Hayden, Trippier

End of June 2027:

Botman, Jacob Murphy, Willock

End of June 2028:

End of June 2029: