With seven games to go, Newcastle find themselves in 6th place, level on points with 5th placed Chelsea and, being rather optimistic, only five points shy of Arsenal and Tottenham in 3rd and 4th place respectively. In short, we are ideally placed for a tilt at Europe.
Indeed Alan Pardew has admitted that Europe wasn’t in our plans for this season and insists that it was a target meant for next season, but it doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t try and make the most of it whilst we can. And with a Good Friday trip to Swansea followed by back to back home games against Bolton and Stoke, there appears to be a chance to gain further momentum in the race for 5th place.
“The target was to be in contention for Europe next year, now we find ourselves in contention for Europe this year,” Pardew told The Journal.
He continued: “Football doesn’t often put an opportunity in front of you, so you’ve got to try and grasp it. I’ve been saying that to the players. We’ve got an opportunity, so let’s grasp it with both hands and hopefully that’s what we’ll do in the remaining games.”
And why are we in this positions? Well it’s down to two things according to Pardew. One is the success of our squad players, which is something Wolfie wrote about yesterday, and the other thing is that we actually have players which are good enough to warrant a stab at Europe.
“You have to say we’ve had outstanding players, and you need that in the Premier League to achieve anything. You can’t get those results without outstanding players. That’s what we’ve got,” said Pardew.
“All the squad have played a part. That doesn’t always happen at a club,” he said. “You can go through a season and squad players come in and they do okay but the team doesn’t get the same results, and there’s a little bit of bad feeling goes on between one group and the other, but we’ve not had that.”
“Players have come in and done as well as the ones that have gone out and I’ve not lost a wink of sleep over selecting someone over somebody else and that’s important.”
“A lot of things were settled last year and we put down the foundations of how we played and conducted ourselves around the training ground and that’s followed through this season so it’s been a lot easier for the new players to settle into that environment,” Pardew concluded.
He then issues one last rallying call ahead of the game tomorrow by saying: “We find ourselves in a great position after the result on Sunday. We’ve got to try and grasp the opportunity now.”
Personally I still think 5th is going to be out of our reach this season, but it shouldn’t stop us going for it whilst we can. Why not? Make hay whilst the sun shines if you like.
If we keep winning games between now and the end of the season then who knows what will happen? It’s been a season of unexpected success on so many levels so why should it end here? If we can keep getting the points on the board then perhaps we won’t even have to worry about who is playing who in the FA Cup after all?
Now it’s just up to our boys to take the opportunity presented to them.
I am a bit concerned about this final push, we will now have to play the teams that are somebody . 😆
Toonale(Quote)
Good words from Pards, and I agree we have to grasp the chance when its there because we don’t know what will happen next year.
So well done to him and well done to the team.
Big Dave(Quote)
we havent played anybody yet have we?? 😀 😀 😀 😀
icedog(Quote)
http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/newcastle-united/nufc-news/2012/04/05/stats-show-danny-simpson-is-league-s-top-right-back-72703-30698212/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter
batty(Quote)
Who’s going to swansea then? Just noticed that the seat numbers on my 2 tickets aren’t next to each other anyone elses like this?
toon1892f(Quote)
We wrapped up 6th on sunday for me so we can now start looking up the table, If we can get something at swansea with back to back home matches to come it sets us up for a interesting end to the season… 😎
CC(Quote)
so is guthrie and perch out tomorrow? looks like santon and raylor should come in if so! gna be a hard game but we are very capable of embarrasin them on the counter attack!
Army69(Quote)
Good read Batty.
Fans that moan about Simmo do irritate me, however are well within their rights to do that.
Fans that go on twitter to slate the players are an utter disgrace.
If he wasn’t putting in the effort, like Jose at the end of last season, i would say it’s possibly justified, but to berate a player after a bad performance (which according to the stats have been rare) is disgusting when he gives it his all.
SolanosTrumpet(Quote)
Ice not yet, but that will change tomorrow night 😆 .
Batts I have been saying all season that Simmo isn’t a world beater but he’s not as bad as a lot of our fans make out. 😉
CC yeah 6th is ours now, but now we have to go for 5th
Big Dave(Quote)
solano agree 😉
batty(Quote)
dave well acording to stats hes better than most 😉
batty(Quote)
Think it will be a good game tomorrow reckon we will nick it 2.3
toon1892f(Quote)
dave
Just win as many as we can and see where we end up, The teams above us still have some tricky fixtures left and chelsea have at least three more cup matches and spuds form is starting to tail off…
CC(Quote)
We have 4 winnable games coming up in my opinion. Swansea and Wigan away, Stoke and Bolton at home. If we can get say nine points off of those we’d be heading into the last three games against Chelsea, City and Everton with a real reason to have a go at them.
toonsy(Quote)
Anybody seen this yet? In praise of Danny Simpson…
http://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/newcastle-united/nufc-news/2012/04/05/stats-show-danny-simpson-is-league-s-top-right-back-72703-30698212/2/
Fans Should Own The Club(Quote)
Oops… just saw Batty already posted. Sorry!
Fans Should Own The Club(Quote)
What Pardew says is spot on, we have a fantastic opportunity but part of me wishes he and the players just kept their traps shut and got on with it. Give the old ‘there’s still alot of points to play for’ answer to these questions and then discuss there ambitions behind closed doors. The only reason is that, if the unthinkable happens and we don’t get Europe I dont want that to be confused with failure. What we have done this season is outstanding and I’d hate for that to be forgotten because we don’t make Europe. I think it’s very unlikely that we will miss out on Europa but with statements like this and one from Tiote the other day that he still wants the Champions League, which of course raises fans expectation.
We have some difficult games ahead and injuries are starting to kick in. Im not being pessimistic just realistic. As a manager and players, they should let the fans and the media do the talking.
Sharpy17(Quote)
with chelsea involved in cl and fa semi finals,spurs involved in fa semis,and arsenal having tough game at the weekend,if we can get a win tomorrow,i can see us finishing top 5 and dare i say it even higher,still a lot to do, but,as someone once said, its a funny old game 😀 😀
mg man(Quote)
I personally think that if we win our next 4 games (and they are winnable, especially the form we’re in) we will be in the top 4 by the end of them games. Whether we’ll stay there I don’t know but I think another 4 wins would give us 7 wins on the bounce – that got Arsenal there so why not us?
Stuart79(Quote)
We’ll know where we stand after this weekends games, if we get 6 points and teams above us drop any we’ll have a realistic chance of 5th or even 4th although it might come down to the chelsea game – will be happy enough with 6th, hopefully things will fall our way with the FA cup and we’ll get Europa league
stevep(Quote)
Whats happened with the final push of your lass toonsy anyhoo. She popped yet? 🙂
DJG(Quote)