Rafa Benitez faces a £5million block preventing him from walking out on the Newcastle job, which means he is likely to stay for now even though relations with the board and owner Mike Ashely have been damaged seemingly beyond repair after the transfer window.
Benitez has two more years left on the £5m-a-year deal he signed in 2016 and would have to pay the compensation if he were to walk out now.
Unless a club offers Newcastle compensation to release Benitez from his contract, it is unlikely Ashley would allow him to go.
It means Benitez is effectively stuck at the club for now with a wholly dysfunctional relationship with the board and is expected to do the best job he can keeping Newcastle in the Premier League despite the lack of investment, something he expected and believed had been promised over the summer.