Newcastle's wantaway star Alexander Isak is set to return to the club's training ground amid Liverpool's bid to sign the Sweden striker, reports claim.
Isak has been training alone at the training facilities of old club Real Sociedad after informing Newcastle he wants to consider he options this summer.
The 25-year-old has not joined Newcastle on their pre-season tour of Asia amid the uncertainty around his future, with manager Eddie Howe admitting the situation was not in his control.
Liverpool have already had a £120m bid rejected by Newcastle, who value the player at closer to £150m and are in no rush to sell him given that he has three years left on his contract at St James' Park.
According to the Athletic, Isak is now set to travel back to the UK after a brief period of training at Sociedad's Zubieta base, which he has been using when they are empty rather than training alongside his former team-mates.
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He will not be linking up with the rest of his Newcastle team-mates and Howe and Co prepare for a friendly clash against Tottenham on Sunday, before two more friendlies against Espanyol and Atletico Madrid.
The report claims Liverpool are not planning to submit a second offer for Isak after their initial "take it or leave it" bid, but remain interested in the player.
The Reds have already spent nearly £300m on a host of high-profile signings, including £116.5m on Florian Wirtz - which was a British transfer record - £79m on forward Hugo Ekitike, £50m on left-back Milos Kerkez and £29m on right-back Jeremie Frimpong.
Adding Isak to their squad would force them to smash another transfer record but as things stand the move looks to be difficult to pull off.
Liverpool have managed to balance the books by selling Trent Alexander-Arnold to Real Madrid for £10m and Luis Diaz to Bayern for £63m, while Darwin Nunez is reportedly in talks to join Al-Hilal.
Newcastle boss Howe said he was in the dark over Isak's future but was hopeful the club could still hang onto their talisman.
“I really don’t know what is going to happen next, but from our perspective, we still support Alex in every way, and my wish is still that we see him in a Newcastle shirt again,” he said.
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