RAFAEL BENITEZ admits Newcastle United will have to break the longest-standing transfer record in the top-flight if they want to avoid another season where their leading goalscorer does not make it into double figures.

The Magpies play their penultimate game of the season at Wembley tonight as they take on a Tottenham Hotspur side desperate for three points to aid their pursuit of a Champions League place.

While Spurs can call on Harry Kane, whose 27 league goals this season have only been surpassed by Liverpool’s Mo Salah, Ayoze Perez moved to the top of Newcastle’s scoring charts when his second-half strike at Watford last weekend took him to six Premier League goals in 34 games.

No side in the top-flight boasts a leading scorer with fewer goals to his name, and a new centre-forward will be at the top of Benitez’s wanted list when he sits down with Mike Ashley to discuss his transfer budget for the summer.

Newcastle’s transfer record remains the £16.8m that was paid to sign Michael Owen in August 2005, but while Ashley has refused to go above that figure throughout the whole of his decade-long tenure on Tyneside, Benitez has warned of the consequences unless there is a change of tack this summer.

“If you want to bring in a striker with a guarantee of more than ten or 15 goals a season, then you have to pay money for him, for sure,” said the Newcastle boss, whose future beyond the end of the season remains uncertain as the final year of his contract draws near. “More than £16m? In this market, yes.

“I like to coach and improve players, and sometimes that means the owners do not have to spend too much. I have always been concerned about taking care of the numbers.

“In England, I have been learning to work with a business plan. You have to have a realistic business plan, and then if you know that, you have to work on that. Does that mean you have to break the record? If it is necessary, you can do it. If it is not necessary, you still have to be sure you have the funds to compete.”

Benitez’s demands to Ashley are essentially twofold. First, he wants to know he will be given a large enough transfer budget to enable him to compete with the likes of Everton, Burnley and Leicester City for a top-eight finish next season. Having guided Newcastle into the top half of the table despite minimal investment last summer, the Magpies manager wants to head into a new campaign with a realistic chance of challenging for Europe.

Just as importantly, however, he also wants a greater degree of freedom to pursue his leading targets. Last summer, he was extremely frustrated at Lee Charnley’s failure to sign Willy Caballero and Tammy Abraham even though he had identified them as his key targets. The players fell within the budgetary parameters he had been given, and had expressed an interest in moving to St James’ Park, yet they ended up going elsewhere because Charnley was unable to sign off on a deal. Benitez would regard a similar log-jam this summer as unacceptable.

A couple of the Spaniard’s early summer targets are obvious, and even Charnley should be able to complete a deal for Martin Dubravka given Newcastle have already agreed a clause that enables them to sign the Slovakian permanently provided they add £4m to the £1.8m loan fee that was paid in January.

Prising Kenedy from Chelsea will be more difficult, but Benitez is desperate to retain the Brazilian’s services, even if it means having to agree to another season-long loan deal once a new manager is in place at Stamford Bridge.

Kenedy will make his final appearance as a loan player this evening as he cannot face his permanent employers on Sunday, and Islam Slimani has now returned to Leicester City following the end of his loan spell.

Slimani failed to score a single goal during his three-month stay on Tyneside, and Benitez will not be considering him for a permanent deal this summer.

“I said he can go because he will not be part of the team in these two games,” said the Magpies manager. “The easiest one (to resolve) is Martin Dubravka because it depends on us. I can say I would like this or would like that, but it doesn’t matter at the moment, we don’t know.

“The main thing with Slimani is that he came with an injury and he didn’t have time to perform or be fit soon enough. Then, when we won, it was more difficult for him to go in the team because we were winning.”

The Spanish press have linked Benitez with a possible move for Fernando Torres, with the former Liverpool striker set to leave Atletico Madrid this summer as a free agent.

Benitez paid £20m to sign Torres when he was manager at Anfield – that figure remains the highest price he has paid for a player in English football – and while he has not had any formal contact with the 34-year-old, he did not completely dismiss the prospect of the pair being reunited on Tyneside.

“We are not talking about players yet,” he said. “We have to play two games and see what happens. Fernando is a great player, he did really well for us (at Liverpool). He’s an icon and idol at Atletico Madrid, and I don’t know what he will do in the future.

“He’s still a good player, and obviously he did really well with us. He will have good memories, like I have good memories.”

Newcastle (probable, 4-2-3-1): Dubravka; Yedlin, Lejeune, Lascelles, Dummett; Shelvey, Diame; Ritchie, Perez, Kenedy; Gayle