Get one of these, 80% off in Sports Direct
Newcastle United at the horribly named Sports Direct Arena
awaits for the boys on the final part of the Week from Hell Trilogy. Having lost two players after Part 1 and
another after Part 2, in addition to the one in Africa and the one in Asia – we
would now be down to the bare bones and needing to buy some players a.s.a.p……
if we were managed by ‘that’ negligle tosser.
As it is, we are managed by Ronald Koeman who just responded with ‘we
have many young players that we can use’.
Love it.
Newcastle at the moment are not managed by anybody – well
they are but it’s John Carver who is like your Geordie mate from down the
pub. Think Jimmy Nail’s character in Auf
Wiedersehen, Pet. Did you know that the
term ‘Pet’ has been banned up there now because it’s been deemed as
sexist. The shit you find out playing
quiz games at Christmas. So, having
finally got rid of Alan Pardew who was the devil they knew, the Newcastle fans
are now waiting for Mike Ashley to get them a new manager. The cynical amongst us would wonder if he was
waiting until after the transfer window was closed so that the new manager had
no chance to spend any money. It will be
interesting to see if he sells a player (Sissoko probably) before he gets a manager
in place. On a personal note, my
Grandfather was a Geordie so I’ve always had a bit of a soft spot for them and
I hope they do well, after today.
The team news filtered through and Saints were more or less
as I expected. The 4-3-3 formations was
back with the expected back 4 and Pellè, Elia and Tadic up front. Steve Davis and JWP were always going to be
two of the three midfielders and Harrison Reed was chosen ahead of Jack Cork
who was on the bench which also contained Shane Long who was somewhat
unfortunate to miss out having played so well on Wednesday. Newcastle lined up with one striker, the 5
foot nothing Ayoze Perez so they were going to have to play some football for
him to get on the ball. Cabella was on
the wing and if ever you wanted to prove that the ratings on FIFA are wildly
out for some players then he’s your man.
Great on FIFA but does fuck all on the pitch. The midfield looked strong enough with
Colback and Sissoko in there but this was balanced out by Anita, who is one of the most ineffective players I've ever seen. I'm sure that if he sneaked off the pitch then no one would notice. A defence with Coloccini (massively overrated
in my book) and Dummett (a left back) in the centre looks like it might be a
bit leaky.
The opening exchanges were a bit scrappy and long ball. We weren’t retaining possession much and
didn’t look particularly calm in possession.
Newcastle looked a threat on the flanks and Haidara burst easily past
Reed before Clyney saw him off to give Newcastle a corner. Mike Ashley put the corner on sale for £19.99
which was an 80% discount on the recommended retail price, honest. The corner was headed away to the edge of the
box and Gouffran tried a ridiculously optimistic volley from 30 yards out which luckily was
straight down Fraser’s throat.
From out first real attack and against the run of play we
took an undeserved lead. José chipped a
ball forwards and Graziano superbly laid it off with his chest to JWP as Coloccini
totally committed himself to winning a ball which he was never going to
win. With Coloccini out of the game, JWP
slid the ball through and Eljero Elia had come off the left win and lashed it
first time, under Krul who went down in instalments, to put us 1-0 up. Whether he was a bad boy or not in his past,
the good news is that Elia is obviously grateful for the opportunity to play
here and his celebratory run straight to Ronald Koeman was a nice touch.
We’re now playing some decent stuff and Pellè knocks down
again to spark some nice play up the wing between Elia and Tadic. We win and throw which is knocked back to
Clyney who gets fouled by Gouffran.
JWP’s delivery is perfect and Fonte has totally lost Coloccini but he
thumps a poor header over the bar. You
gotta hit the target from there.
Lo and fucking behold we find ourselves at 1-1 soon
afterwards as we concede against the run of play as Newcastle did. Cabella gets on the ball in midfield and threads it though via a
deflection towards Gouffran. It’s
keepers ball all day long but whether he called and Gardos ignored him or
whether he didn’t call – there’s a fuck up and Gardos slides in to clear it and
his clearance hits Gouffran on the shin and it could go anywhere but it flies
in the top corner. It’s an unlucky break
from our point of view and I really don’t know how Gouffran has the neck to
celebrate it like he meant it. Carver is
giving it the large one on the sideline as well, as you’d expect from a Geordie
in the pub. I'm surprised he hasn't had a bar installed in the technical area since he became pretend manager. He could lean against it, get pissed and talk shite to his mates.
Newcastle have their tail up now though and pass their way
up the right and suddenly Sissoko is nearly though. Clyney goes to ground and gets enough on the
ball to mean it’s the correct decision not to give a penalty. Cabella, though shit, plays another decent
ball in from the right and Perez meets it on the half volley and though for a
second it looks like it may be heading in, it eventually lobs tamely wide. It’s the kind of chance where the home fans
go ‘ooooooh’ and the away fans go ‘oh shit….. ahhhhhh’.
Halt time was upon us and overall, I think we have to be
happy with what we’ve seen so far. After
a shaky start, Reed had come more into the game and we were looking decent
going forward, with the exception of Tadic who really looked like he couldn’t
be arsed, a bit like he did at Ipswich.
Elia was looking strong on the ball and there were definitely going to
be chances in the second half with Dumb and Dummett at centre half.
We weren’t long into the second half when Ronald rolled the
dice and brought on Shane Long and Jack Cork.
Tadic, who was infuriating both Saints fans and the Newcastle bench with
his rolling about, was an obvious one to come off but it was a slight surprise
to see JWP hooked as well. From the
restart we manage to lose the ball and eventually, the rarest of things as
Haidara got the better of Clyney and swung in a cross but Gouffran was never
going to score two in one game and his header was shite and it slid off his
head and well wide. I find it hard to
understand why when the replays were shown, he was smiling. You’ve just missed a golden chance to put
your team 2-1 up and you think it’s amusing.
Like when Fonte missed the chance in the first half and
Newcastle made us pay, it’s now our turn as following a bout of head tennis,
Long goes up for a header and beats Coloccini who is again, steaming into a
challenge that he’s never going to win and Elia is through again. He jinks onto his right foot and shoots, a
nice little nick off of Janmaat who has tried to cover round and in off the
post. Get in!!! It’s shite from Coloccini again who has David
Luiz’ hair and the same amount of defensive instinct. None.
From the restart, Steve Davis picks up a booking for some
comedy wrestling of a small child who has invaded the pitch, only it’s actually
Vernon Anita who has made his first impact since he was introduced to both
teams and the mascots before the game and given a pendant to mark the occasion.
There are 20 minutes to go and Newcastle have thrown on the
giant Sammy Ameobi and also Riviere who is one of the French blokes they signed
in the summer who hasn’t done anything yet.
However, he wins a corner which Colback curls in and Fraser has a
horrible flap at it and Graziano heads clear.
He also heads away the next one and Shane Long the one after that. Another corner and Dummett has a free header
from 5 yards and it slides off his head and wide. Sitter.
Again, it looks like we’ve made them pay as we build up
through Reed in the middle and the ball gets fed out to Elia. His cross is recycled by Clyne who plays a
1-2 with Corky and puts over a pearler which Graziano, unimpeded by Dumb and
Dummett, meets and heads it over Krul and sees it smack off the bar and
away. Apparently, he’s hit the woodwork
6 times this season but it seems more than that. I’m sure it does to him anyway.
As the game ticks down, Elia is off and replaced with Matty
Targett. This does however mean that
we’re retreating further and further back which would be fine if we were
clearing the ball which we’re not. From
an Ameobi cross (he’s better than his shite brother), Cabella plays an airshot
from 5 yards. There are 3 minutes of
injury time remaining when Saints are trying and failing to clear the ball and
it eventually sits up for Riviere to smash a volley goalwards. The ref is looking straight at it as it hits
José Fonte’s hand which is up at shoulder height. You can tell by the way all the pace comes
off the ball that it’s hit his hand and it’s a clear penalty, 100%. Not given.
Fuck me we got lucky there. The
only explanation I can give is that it hit the hand and then hit the chest
straight away and the ref just didn’t see the first part.
One more attack to repel and Gardos does that and that’s
it. A bit fortunate but they all
count. We weren’t at our best today but
we’ve had 3 tough away games in a week and were without one of our main centre
halves and both of the main men in midfield.
We’ve won the fucking lot and sorry Adrian Durham, it doesn’t matter a
shite how you do it.
The story of the day is of course Eljero Elia who did so
much more than his two goals. I like the
fact that he’s not afraid to put himself about and on one buccaneering run up
the left, he left 3 Newcastle players on the ground. If he can maintain this form he’s going to be
a major player for us over the rest of the season. He looked much better today than he did
against Man United so I think we can assume that there’s more to come. The post match Man of the Match interviews
with our new Flying Dutchman confirmed what we suspected already, that he really
wants to be here and is going to grab the opportunity with both hands.
Ronald was delighted as usual and said this was an even
bigger win than the Man United game. I
can see where he’s coming from as we were without players and it was the 3rd
game. However, the Koeman household will
not be celebrating the fact that he got one over on John Carver. I sense the Louis Van Gaal victory might mean
slightly more.
Talking of Carver, he used his post match interview to
question why there’s wasn’t a manager in place yet at Newcastle. He obviously wants the job but they’d be mad
to give it to him. It’s good to see a
local lad making his way with the club but he’s not manager material. I’m sure that even Mike Ashley can see
that. It’s as obvious as the fact that
no item has never ever been on sale for full price in Sports Direct, ever.
A while ago it looked like Harrison Reed was not going to
get a game for any reason but now he looks like a genuine option for the
manager, especially for the next few weeks until Morgan and Big Vic come
back. He gets bustled out the way by
physically bigger players occasionally but with game time he’ll learn how to deal
with that and he already has a superb reading of the game. You can see a bit of succession planning here - to me he looks like a slightly more defensive
version of Steven Davis and it’s great to see another kid come through the
Academy and look comfortable at Premier League level.
We’re back to 3rd in the League which is mental
and still doesn’t seem right. What does
seem right is that we have broken the 40 points barrier so it’s unlikely we’ll
be going down. All the big guns beneath
us are beginning to pick up wins with Liverpool and Spurs in particular
managing to string a few results together.
I don’t pay too much attention though so I do wonder if they’ve had a
run of games against the really big boys yet like we've just had.
Enough of the league though, next up is the FA Cup and a 4th
Round, Saturday 3pm kick off against Crystal Palace at St. Mary’s. Savour the occasion and just maybe the season
can get even better.
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