Perhaps the most damaging defeat yet in Newcastle United’s season, as a game dubbed by many as a ‘must win’ ended in a disastrous defeat to Brentford.
That’s now three losses in a row, 10 goals conceded in that time, and a defeat to leave us 12th in the table; 10 points off the top five and 10 points off relegation.
There were audible boos from many at the full time whistle (the first time we’ve seen that after a league defeat in the Eddie Howe era?) and they were justified. It was a total mess, as we looked a side so low on confidence, lacking in energy, too easy to score (again) and equally easy to defend against.
Howe made five changes from the midweek cup exit at Man City, switching back to a 4-3-3 as Pope, Bruno, Murphy, Barnes and Wissa came in, seeing Ramsdale, Burn, Ramsey, Gordon and Woltemade drop to the bench.
It wasn’t a pretty start, as looked like a side struggling for confidence and lacking cohesion, giving away the ball too easily and allowing Brentford to settle early.
Willock and Hall, to their credit, were bright and making things happen in flashes down our left, then came our goal against the run of play. Another wicked Bruno corner and a rare Botman header to send us 1-0 up at the Gallowgate on 25 minutes.
A brilliant burst from Hall and scramble in the box ended with Wissa having an instinctive effort cleared off the line – then came the collapse in the final 10 minutes of a poor first half. Trippier couldn’t stop the cross which Janelt headed home, then Murphy’s handball from Jensen’s goal-bound shot allowed Thiago to step up and score his 17th of the season.
Wissa had been anonymous against his former club, Murphy was giving the ball away far too cheaply, Bruno looked rusty after missing our last four and Barnes wasn’t getting much joy out of Kayode. There were some boos as the half-time whistle sounded, showing the shift in mood at St James’ Park after chants of ‘Eddie Howe’s black and white army’ from the Strawberry corner moments earlier.
Something had to change and Howe didn’t waste any time in doing so, bringing on Elanga, who I was shocked to see on the bench after that confidence-boosting solo goal at City. Joining him was Woltemade, who went in just behind Wissa in a 4-2–3-1 formation, leaving Willock unfortunate to come off after his decent first half display.
The switch saw us get more of the ball, but we rarely threatened and moved it too slowly. Aside from Thiaw’s strike and the Bruno penalty to draw us level on 79 minutes, we didn’t have another shot on goal in a thoroughly miserable second half that ended in disaster.
The ball wasn’t cleared, Brentford moved it quickly to target Trippier’s side once again and Ouattara fired under Pope. 3-2, another collapse just after we’d scored and zero sign of any fight back as we wilted to a deserved defeat. Boos at the full time whistle and a sinking defeat that leaves us 12th and with a mountain to climb (given the fixtures ahead) to get back in the mix for those European spots.
Newcastle XI: Pope – Trippier, Thiaw, Botman, Hall – Bruno, Tonali, Willock – Murphy, Wissa, Barnes
Substitutes: Ramsdale, Osula, Elanga, Woltemade, Burn, A.Murphy, Ramsay, Shahar, Neave
Brentford XI: Kelleher – Kayode, Van den Berg, Ajer, Henry – Janelt, Henderson, Jensen – Outtara, Thiago, Lewis Potter
Next up, Spurs away on Tuesday, before an FA Cup trip to Aston Villa next Saturday.
Keep the faith. HWTL.
No words … been sh..ite too many times now.
Gilly Toon(Quote)
Brentford’s summer made ours look like smooth sailing. Yet Keith Andrews has pulled our pants down home and away. We’re just kicking the can down the road now…
Scott(Quote)
Howe was out coached today.
Fair play to Keith Andrews, he spotted Trippier was a weak link and he switched wingers to target him – and it worked coz Trippier was partly responsible for all 3 goals.
Howe should have spotted it and reacted – but he left him on until the 87th minute.
There penalty was no way a penalty – but the game wasn’t lost on that decision imo.
Our forward play was so poor. I expected Wissa to be like a man possessed today but he was poor.
I still think give Howe til the end of the season. If he can turn things around mores the better. If not – we aren’t getting relegated 🤷🏼♂️.
It gives that time to decide are they going to fully back Howe or start again with a new manager.
Sharpy17(Quote)
Brentford have done the double over us. I like Eddie Howe, but I’m really struggling now. We have poor performance after poor performance. He won’t play any of the youngsters even when they’re on the bench. Waltermade seems to be going backwards and Wissa is just not clicking with the team. If Eddie does go though, I’ve no idea who could come in to improve things.
Gilly Toon(Quote)
How Trippier is getting his game beggars belief, yet Howe sticks with his favourites
very fortunate not to get sent off with an obvious pull early on with his lack of pace exposed.
Barnes has gone tepid after his hot spell.
We have no cohesion from back to front and don’t look like any sort of unit, we just haven’t got a clue they look as though they have never played together.
Tottenham have 11 injury worries, on today’s showing they could play the stiff’s and still win.
Joseph(Quote)
We are so vulnerable to long balls, all of their goals were so basic, so frustrating. Miley can’t get fit soon enough to replace trippier who just can’t cut it anymore sadly. After getting away with the penalty I actually thought we made enough chances to win (whether we’d have held a lead who knows) but Woltermade gets into space and will have a good touch but is just so trigger shy outside of the box.
It’s panic mode now but for whatever reason I think we’ll get results in the CL and against spurs, no chance for Villa or man city though please play the kids!
Newkie(Quote)
It doesn’t take a genius to work out that Tripps is the weak link he’s been that for the past two seasons and it’s why he was targeted today and will be every time he plays.
I’d rather had seen Shahar playing regardless if he is a young un he surely couldn’t be any worse at least he has pace.
This season is a disaster that just keeps going, i try to find the positives in games but this is getting harder every week.
Eddie can’t seem to get a tune out of players that bust a gut for him in previous seasons, and i think if England come calling in the summer he’ll be gone.
I don’t think he’ll get sacked and i don’t think he deserves it either but it’s getting real hard to stick up for the guy.
Absolutely glorious(Quote)
It’s really tough with Howe.
The underlying challenge is the squad – there are so few goals and (admittedly not helped by the tactics) lower than average quality on the ball. Factor in the injuries and I am not confident many other managers would do loads better.
That said, there are some repeated mistakes that are hard to overlook. As everyone else has highlighted, Trippier is done. Just stop playing him, youth players surely can’t be worse and at least we start building for the future and set a culture of bringing youth through which we all want to see. Aside from Tripps, I can’t help but fear that Howe’s conclusion from today will be that early subs and different tactics don’t work and he will go back to the standard style of play. He looks broken at the moment and not in the right state to be creative and confident to trial changes and be comfortable with mistakes without reverting to type.
Looking forward, it’s up to the board to fix this:
– get the stadium and training ground decision done and leverage the energy and excitement this brings
– nail the summer transfer window EARLY – and ensure Howe is part of it but not leading/dictating it
– curtail the responsibilities on Howe that are exhausting him – free him to focus on the day to day with the team (it’s on Howe whether he can transition to a head coach rather than manager…if he can’t then it has to be over – the role of manager doesn’t exist anymore at the top)
Howe the toon(Quote)
The key change is that he himself is now saying he is not good enough
Mike(Quote)
Any U-21 youthful and stronger defender should play in Trippier position. Tonali was the one who should not appear on the team list, he created nothing, he didn’t bother to tackle or defence, just going through the motion, play acting to fool the team and fans. It had been like that in most of the games already, his heart was no longer with Newcastle or he may be gambling again. The whole team and coaches must be blind not to spot his problems. Rather have a junior player with the heart and energy to help out in Midfield
Jordan(Quote)
ManYoo – changed to Carrick. 4 wins in a row
Chelsea- changed to Rosenior. 4 wins in a row.
Just saying
macn0ble(Quote)
When you watch their 3rd goal back, when the lad plays the ball over the top our back 4 were so out of position!!.
They looked more like Z than a flat back 4.
We had not long pulled level so you’d think there would have been a discipline to hold a shape and protect that first – especially from the more senior players.
There was no midfielder anywhere near the lad passing the ball & we’ve all seen how out of position Trippier was.
That for me is more on the players – the captains, leaders and more senior players on the pitch to manage that.
These are well paid professionals who don’t need spoon feeding every instruction.
Howe can only be blamed so much – the players HAVE to do better.
Sharpy17(Quote)
Sharpy exactly, these are basics about being in your right position and doing your job regardless of formation. The one thing in Trips favour was that in the absence of Bruno / even with him at least it was added leadership in the side and it’s clear that is needed so I can see why he’s resisted chucking another player in. But with trips in such bad form now that leadership has to be on Burn and Bruno as I don’t see the others stepping up.
Newkie(Quote)
Too many “chiefs” and leaders on the pitch and not enough “Indians”
I wouldn’t have scored Trippier a 1 today, similarly Murphy.
Mike:- When Howe is honest enough to admit he is not good enough, and give him credit for taking responsibility for it, that is a real worry as that’s a bad message to the players and everyone associated with the club especially the owners who have been generally inactive in so many ways.
It’s either a cry for help from those around him, who need to respond by giving him that help, with a proper coaching team and he needs to start using the promising youth. Osula looked more of a danger than Woltemade and Wissa combined, and compared to Murphy, Elanga looked like David Ginola.
Joseph(Quote)
He’s saying he’s not been good enough not he’s not good enough there’s a big difference
Absolutely glorious(Quote)
Andrews didn’t outcoach Eddie, anyone with a brain can see Trips was a weak link. Trips has been a brilliant servant for the club, a key player in our revival but sadly his pace has gone and when that happens a player makes mistakes, gets pulled out of position and can cost you a game especially when that player is a defender.
Pope needs protecting which means a good defense is a must and we do have good defenders in Thaiw, Botman Hall, Tino, even Miley at RB was ok , Schar is ok but due to Injuries and fatigue we are not a settled defense any more, to a point Eddies hands are tied. It’s true he doesn’t play the youth, why not ,who knows, maybe they are not up to it, who can say.
Does anyone watch them regular? would love to hear from them.
So we have this situation where Trips is being played and it’s obvious to us all that
every time Eddie plays him he will be targeted . Maybe it’s big boy pants time for Eddie and he has to take a chance on youth .
By the way our owners don’t get to walk away from this mess scot free either, in the summer they let Eddie down imo, too slow to deal with the Isak situation and wasted time on players who were clearly using us for the moves they really wanted which we could all see happening. I hope we don’t get sucked into a scrap at the bottom, at this stage nothing would surprise me.
kimtoon(Quote)
I forgot Burn , great defender but again not fast and getting on.
kimtoon(Quote)
Kimtoon and Sharpy Thank you for your thoughtful and measured posts. This is a time for cool heads. Strange to think its only a few months ago we were cheering the team and manager through the streets of Newcastle to booing them off the pitch yesterday.
I hate to think we could stupidly find ourselves on the manager roundabout going for old has-beens or never was hopefuls! We remain short of quality that we can’t address till the summer so its dig in time and grind out some results ugly or otherwise.
nutmag(Quote)
I have never understood booing your team nutmag .
kimtoon(Quote)
I respect Howe even more for admitting publicly his short fallings. I know he was prompted by the journalist asking a question – but still, I thought his answer was honest & eloquently delivered – so much so it like he’s known for a while rather than asking as the words left his mouth.
I think it’s fair to remember that this is only his 2nd season navigating a team through a CL season – that’s very inexperienced. But how do you get experience without doing it?! – and I expect him to get through to the last 16 at least.
He’s more than proven himself as a top PL manager without CL – but juggling all 4 competitions is proving difficult.
You can’t question his work ethic or desire to do great things with NUFC – people are allowed to struggle – that’s when they need support. It’s easy to support when things are going good.
I make my decision in the summer.
Sharpy17(Quote)
kimtoon(Quote)
Indeed you cannot build a house if you don’t have the correct tools. He’s not been given the correct tools or enough of them to build the team he needs tonight compete on so many fronts. I know PSR and corrupt league chiefs have played their part, but teams like Bournemouth and Brighton and even the Mackems have found, and seem to keep finding, these gems of players that don’t cost the earth. We need to find them, and then play them. Again, look at Rayan for Bournemouth, they took the chance on him and we didn’t. 🤷🏻♂️
Gilly Toon(Quote)
i want Howe to stay but he must stop picking players he like becauce they done a job in the past times move on,he knows good players he wanted l/pool player doing great he wanted the Chelsea c/f but got nowt worth having imo
icedog(Quote)
These players saying they will leave if we don’t get into the CL next season need to take a good, long, hard, look in the mirror. They are the ones responsible for getting there or not getting there. 🤬🤬🤬
Gilly Toon(Quote)
I think a big problem this season has been players playing for the international spots rather than playing for Eddies NUFC and giving him what he needs – or that’s how it’s felt to me anyway.
Gordon seemingly only willing to play LW – but playing how he thinks Tuchel wants him to play rather than how Eddie needs him to play. Likewise with Wolt – he plays more a 10 role for Germany so has held back and tried to play that position for us rather than the 9 Eddie needs him to be. Tonali similarly.
It feels like they are all playing with their own agenda.
Sharpy17(Quote)
Spot on mate, been thinking the same, I don’t like Gordons attitude and no one will convince me that Sandro doesn’t want back to Italy. Well we need to start looking in earnest now for replacements, as I have no problem with both of them leaving if they want out then, go .
kimtoon(Quote)
I also need to understand PSR?!
How can you have a financial framework which sees us forced to sell:
Elliott Anderson sold – £40m
Yannick Minteh sold – £35m (having spent £8m to buy him, so a £27m sale really).
£62m profit.
Replaced by
Arron Ramsey bought for £45m
Anthony Elanga bought for £65m
£110m spend.
But that’s ok?!
Also – for context, transfermarkt now values these players:
Anderson – £60m
Minteh – £40m
Ramsey – £35m
Elanga – £50m
Meaning we not only have we spent more than we recouped for, but the players we have brought in are valued less than those we sold.
A point many people forget to mention when talking about wasted more in the summer.
It was a spend forced upon us by PSR – because I’m pretty sure Howe would have kept both Anderson & Mineth.
Sharpy17(Quote)
When we buy players, it’s usually over 5 years for amortisation so only a portion of the purchase price is counted. We took Vlachodimos in this way. The sale is fully counted, the purchase isn’t.
Gilly Toon(Quote)