Newcastle United boss Alan Pardew is determined to keep hold of skipper Fabricio Coloccini.

Liverpool are among the interested parties watching how the discussions develop.

Pardew said: "The priority for me is Coloccini's new contract and one or two others. We are focused on that because we want to keep our best players. He is our captain and I want to keep him, and negotiations are due to restart shortly.

"We are still vulnerable to the Champions' League clubs and we still need to balance the books, therefore even in this window, I am on my guard. I see us keeping the same squad together but there is no guarantee.

"You look at us now with the signing of Cisse, and players like Cabaye and Santon, we are suddenly becoming a threat. If we can keep everyone fit and with eight games to go, keep ourselves in and around sixth or seventh we will have less pressure on ourselves than the others and then we can be dangerous.

"But we have to get ourselves in that position and to get us there we need a big squad."