• French defender is Newcastle’s second signing of the summer • Rafael Benítez: ‘He’s good with both feet, big and good in the air’

This article is more than 3 years old

This article is more than 3 years old

Newcastle United have announced the signing of the defender Florian Lejeune from Eibar on a five-year deal.

The 26-year-old Lejeune has agreed a five-year-deal with the Premier League club for a fee understood to be around £8.7m, and is their second signing of the summer after they secured a permanent deal for the Ghanaian winger Christian Atsu from Chelsea.

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Paris-born Lejeune began his career with the Centre de Formation de Paris, before spending his formative years with Racing Club de France, Beziers, Sète and Adge.

He moved to Istres, then in Ligue 2, in 2009, before joining Villarreal two years later. After a loan spell back in France with Stade Brestois, Lejeune joined Girona, from where he sealed a move to Manchester City in the summer of 2015.

A further loan at his former club Girona followed, before the former France Under-20 international joined Eibar permanently in July 2016.

“I’m very happy to have signed. Newcastle United is a big club, and I’m very happy to be here,” Lejeune told Newcastle’s website. “When you have a manager like Rafa Benítez who wants you, you are very happy to come. Since I’ve been in touch with the manager, it was an easy decision for me to come here.”

Benítez added: “He is a player that has done very well this year in Spain. I have known about him for a while, since he began playing for Villarreal.

“He has progressed a lot as a player in the last few years and I know he will give us something different at the back – he is good with both feet, he’s big and he’s good in the air also.”