As the title suggests, I’m finding it difficult to believe any club in their right mind would pay £5,000,000 for a striker with half a season left on his contract. This particular Beckford rumour (number 3791 for those of you that have lost count) was also published in the nation’s most unreliable rag – The Sun – so that too adds little credibility to the speculation.

However, this is the Mike Ashley led Newcastle United we’re talking about. If anyone is stupid enough to pay over the odds for a League One striker, who I don’t believe will be any help to them whatsoever if they do make it back to the Premier League this season then it’s most certainly them.

Of course, as January draws closer, we can expect a lot of this stuff. The summer saw Beckford linked with countless Championship sides alongside a couple of Premier League clubs. None of these rumours came true of course and the striker remained a Leeds United player, going on to net eleven goals so far this campaign.

The majority of these rumours will have been invented by his agent looking to draw up interest – afterall, that’s his job – whilst a lot of the remaining ones will have been dreamnt up by the national press who simply can’t help filling their pages with Leeds United gossip. No matter how far we fall, it seems the press still can’t find anyone more interesting than Leeds.

If true – and for the record, I remain unconvinced – then Leeds would be out of their minds to turn it down. Jermaine doesn’t seem to have any intention of signing a new contract and I’d be suprised if we made it through January without him signing a pre-contract elsewhere.

The major problem is that despite our apparently profitable status, it’s unlikely much of the money will be re-invested in the squad. If we lose Jermaine, we lose a huge amount of goals which aren’t easily or cheaply replaced.

The rumours will inevitably persist for as long as Beckford remains a Leeds United player. The fact of the matter is, that if this one is true we have to sell him. £5m is impossible to turn down. It’s too much of an unlikely sum though even for Newcastle so I just can’t see it being true.