Eddie Howe has been speaking to the media following today’s 4-2 defeat to Brentford, bemoaning our awful defensive performance and apologising to Newcastle United fans for such a poor display.
It was a whirlwind start as goals from Mbeumo and Wissa were cancelled out by Isak and then Barnes, but our second-half display was flat and full of more defensive errors, where a series of basic errors allowed Collins to make it 3-2 before Schade made it four in stoppage time.
Howe’s apology to fans
In a message directly to fans after the game, Howe issued an apology to Newcastle supporters, vowing to put things right after defeat left us 12th in the table and closer to Leicester in 17th than the top four:
“I’m really sorry for what we delivered,” Howe said. “We will work as hard as we can to put that right. There was a willingness to win and fight but I don’t think it was strong enough.”
The boss then spoke to the media about our shocking defensive effort, where individual and collective mistakes were blamed as Brentford scored four to make it four games without a win for Newcastle:
“Very disappointed with how we defended today. The four goals we conceded we’ll look back on with regret because it wasn’t just individual mistakes, it was collective mistakes for all the goals, especially the third goal.
“We’ll look back and cringe”
Discussing our defensive effort at the Gtech, Howe didn’t hold back when assessing the goals we conceded, saying we’ll “cringe” at the number of mistakes when players eventually watch the game back.
Speaking to NUFC TV after the match, Howe also said: “The goals we conceded, we’ll look back and cringe. Poor defensively. All the goals featured three or four mistakes. Defend like that and you won’t win any game. You can’t defend like that.
“We weren’t cohesive as a team and we didn’t help each other – and we got punished.
Next up, Newcastle face Leicester City at St James’ Park in a week’s time, followed by a cup quarter-final at home to Brentford the following Wednesday.
I love Howe and have put up arguments for him when people have questioned him recently – but it’s really getting harder.
We have no European football so Howe has the players all week to work on things – yet we are awful in defence, poor in attack. We aren’t great at either defending or attacking set pieces and the amount of stray passes today from numerous players was so noticeable.
We are considerably worse this season to last, despite having a lot less injuries to have to content with.
Now he’s started the apologies – that’s not a good place to be.
Sharpy17(Quote)
I think Eddie has lost the plot, almost starting to look like the Bournemouth scenario where he appeared to run out of ideas, could do with a good clear out in January, can’t see PIF being happy with repeated inconsistent performances from both the management and players.
Joseph(Quote)
That did happen today. And to his credit Barnes hardly jumped for joy when he scored as he knew he’d basically set Brentford up for their second. Third goal was a case of everyone hoping someone else would intervene.
That’s down to tiredness. Both central defenders were tired today, and it showed second half.
Not blaming either, both are top players but after Wednesdays exertions it’s not surprising they were out on their feet. That’s how financial fair play helps the clubs at the top. We couldn’t buy a central defender we wanted in Summer as the price was ridiculous. Though after three years it has to be asked is there anyone coming through the teams academy to have a go and give them a rest.
Eddy Howe is restricted by the numbers he has at his disposal.
Birdy(Quote)
Birdy – I disagree. We are poor at set pieces full stop. We defended it high enough but didn’t stick to the offside trap – after that, I agree it was left to someone else. But that’s a lack of communication rather than tiredness.
Sharpy17(Quote)
Birdy the tiredness you relate to is that not down to the fact we have two ageing center halfs ,that Ashworth brought up in the amazon series about the squad like what is getting reported about now behind the scenes and the worry about it this is down to Howe and Stavley and Ghodoussi supporting him on keeping players when Ashworth wanted to start the trading as much as i like Howe this is on him he wanted to reward certain players that should have been moved on it is starting to catch up with us
Darren Bebb(Quote)
I know most fans think our two young fullbacks are the way forward, they are good attacking but a lot of the time they forget their role is defending. This leaves our central defenders overloaded. Bring back fullbacks that defend first. Lots of reasons for our poor performances, possibly since our new performance director has arrived, hwtl.
Kiddafromthetoon(Quote)
He looks to me like someone who is going to be gone very soon as he has been found out. He has Been Brilliant and we love him BUT we have to move up the ladder into the top 4. I dont think Eddie is the Man for that. We know Marenio had a meeting with the Arabs when he was at the Tyson Fury Fight and has been probably told get your finger out Eddie or we get someone in who has the guns to do so.
Lee UK(Quote)