ARSENAL legend and Ajax director of football Marc Overmars is 'open' to ditching the Dutch giants for a role at Newcastle United, reports claim.

The 48-year-old is under consideration by the Magpies after overseeing a remarkable period of success in Amsterdam since his appointment in 2012.

Overmars has seen his side win four Eredivisie titles on his watch, in addition to building a squad featuring the likes of Frenkie de Jong, Matthijs de Ligt and Donny van de Beek that reached the 2019 Champions League semi-finals.

According to The Times, the former Highbury wing wizard is interested in working for a team with the financial clout of Newcastle, having had to watch his Ajax team dismantled of its best players year after year.

They also claim that Overmars enjoys a good working relationship with the Toon's new board, which features Amanda Staveley, Yasir Al-Rumayyan and Jamie Reuben.

Overmars is under contract at Ajax until 2024.

But it has been revealed that should he wish to leave, he would only need to serve a three-month notice period.

Asked about the sporting director position earlier this week, Staveley said: "We have thought about sporting directors and directors of football but we need to sit down with our board and look at what we have today.

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"You can bring in the best sporting director in the world but you've got no infrastructure.

"Your medical staff, your training facilities, they need really heavy investment and that's what we need to know at every single level.

"We need to attract people to work with us as well who share our dream and will do that."

Graeme Jones will take charge of the team against Crystal Palace tomorrow, after Steve Bruce was sacked earlier this week.

The Toon's manager hunt is well underway, with club chiefs having interviewed former Roma manager Paulo Fonseca over Zoom on Wednesday.

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