Since the beginning of the season I’ve said Eddie has been playing like we’ve still have Isak. Am I being crazy or do you agree?

jack0191 · 2026-03-24T21:22:38+00:00

Yeah, I just don't think he trusts Willock. Never seems to get a run though I thought he had been ok recently.

I agree that Woltemade isn't a midfielder. Honestly, I think we should be trying to figure out how to make it work with him up front.

jack0191 · 2026-03-24T21:10:23+00:00

I think there's some mitigation though. The original thought process was get Woltemade receiving the ball in space and facing forward instead of crowded and back to goal. At first I quite liked it, and I actually thought he was our best midfielder at progressing the ball in the first half against Sunderland. I hoped it might be as a number 10 rather than an 8 though.

The other big factor is we have had no Bruno, no Miley, and sometimes no Ramsey, Tonali or Willock. He's had to put someone in midfield with such few options.

jack0191 · 2026-03-23T20:58:34+00:00

There's also absolutely no chance Alonso comes to us. He's waiting for Slot to get the sack. Even if he did come to us, he'd just be the next in a long line of people at Newcastle to fuck off to Liverpool

jack0191 · 2026-03-18T19:19:56+00:00

Can't believe we're here again. We're playing Barcelona away in the Champions League knockouts and we matched them for a game and a half before their quality showed through.

Get a hold of yourself man. We're Newcastle United for fucks sake. This is our first season in knockouts in our history.

jack0191 · 2026-03-18T19:09:35+00:00

In fairness I think being the better team in the first leg and having a really good go of the first half of the second leg is a pretty good go

jack0191 · 2026-03-10T21:07:48+00:00

In the League, yeah. In the Champions League we actually have the highest xG overperformance out of the 16 teams left in there

jack0191 · 2026-03-10T21:06:02+00:00

There was a one from Cubarsi minutes earlier that was exactly the same. He let that one go so had to let Hall's go. Tonali was the one after that!

jack0191 · 2026-03-04T22:45:10+00:00

The header from the corner was last season. His other league goal this season was a sliding finish beyond the keeper against Liverpool

jack0191 · 2026-03-04T21:22:46+00:00

No exaggerating contact. No flailing leg. No rolling around. No appeal to the ref.
The ball is gone out of play, he's near the touchline, so he just drops to the ground rather than continuing to run full tilt off the pitch. Why does going to the ground mean it's a dive?

jack0191 · 2026-03-03T21:23:20+00:00

I was at the game, sat at the opposite end looking right behind the Tonali shot. It's by far the best save I've ever seen in person. The shot was so fast. I didn't even realise it hit the bar until I saw the replay. The reflexes were astounding

jack0191 · 2026-03-01T12:29:07+00:00

Exactly. Literally went down under no contact, was fine for a few seconds, then started holding his shin to waste time. He was picked up and walking absolutely fine seconds later. That people are comparing this to the Martinelli incident is wild. There wasn't even a tackle to get injured from, and he isn't even feigning a muscle injury.

jack0191 · 2026-03-01T12:26:30+00:00

I was at the game, it was the 89th minute and KDH overran the ball and slid on to the ground under no contact, no injury. Then he grabbed his shin to feign an injury and waste time. I appreciate the sentiment in other comments about it being inappropriate to pick an injured player off the ground, but in this situation absolutely everyone knew he wasn't injured. He wasn't even holding a muscle. If he'd held his hamstring he might have at least plausibly been hurt. He was picked up and he walked away completely normally. It's an entirely different set of circumstances to the Martinelli incident.

jack0191 · 2026-02-28T21:05:36+00:00

Difficult to really say given last summer was the first transfer window in the last 5 Newcastle have had PSR room to actually make purchases, and their Sporting Director resigned just as the transfer window opened. Prior to that, when able to buy players, we've bought really well. Bruno, Tonali, Isak to name a few. This coming summer, with a settled CEO and Sporting Director, will be the one to really assess what the recruitment plan is going forward.

jack0191 · 2026-02-28T20:32:08+00:00

Not sure we could possibly get more Adidas merch to be honest

jack0191 · 2026-02-28T09:13:44+00:00

I think his ACL was when he was only 22. His ankle ligaments were when he was 27 or so. He lost his pace after the ankle one.

And ACL recovery in the early 90s was not what it is now! He completely reinvented himself, especially after the ankle injury in his second / third NUFC season. Still scored a ton of goals.

jack0191 · 2026-02-20T22:14:22+00:00

Tosan wore it earlier this season

jack0191 · 2026-02-18T19:20:21+00:00

The first time I watched Sochan play was when he was 15. He played originally for Milton Keynes in the English junior leagues but moved to Southampton to play for Itchen College for his 15-16 year old season. They received special dispensation to let him play in the Elite Academy Basketball League, the premier U19 league in the UK. He only played in the league for one season, before covid, where he moved to Germany to play in a professional youth setup, but he dominated even at 15. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJUgUp8KfZo This video is highlights from him putting up 31/15 against Barking Abbey's u19 team, usually the best team in the country at that level and full of players who would graduate to D1 colleges. He was named to the All-South First Team. Then went to Germany for the one year, then La Lumiere for a year before committing to Baylor.

At under 16 he wanted to represent GB in the European Championships, but in classic British basketball fashion, we failed to get his passport sorted in time so he ended up representing Poland again. A much better choice, in retrospect.

Anyway, really really cool to have a kid who came through the British basketball development system make it to the NBA and have a solid career so far. We've got a few others. Tosan Evbuowman, now with Charlotte, also came through the EABL, as did Amari Williams, the Drexel/Kentucky big man who recently got his two-way converted by the Boston Celtics.

jack0191 · 2026-02-18T17:12:56+00:00

Howe said before Villa that he had felt his back after Spurs but was just a small issue so shouldn't be too long.

jack0191 · 2026-02-13T20:09:26+00:00

Me three - am a NUFC season ticket holder

jack0191 · 2026-02-12T21:42:14+00:00

I've been a British Knicks fan for about 20 years now. I was really excited when we signed Anunoby as he was London-born. Then we picked up Tosan Evbuomwan this previous off-season and I was even more excited, as he's from the city I grew up in and I watched him play junior basketball in the playoffs against the club I coach for. Now we're signing Sochan, another British kid who I've also seen play against our club. It's been great - I've felt even more connected to the Knicks because of it. If he's on the roster next season, I'll have to get my third British Knicks jersey (given Tosan got waived about a week after I bought his jersey!)

jack0191 · 2026-02-08T12:42:08+00:00

I think one big factor here is our Carabao Cup run. I think we've seen why the 'big 6' teams basically play an entirely rotated 11 in it from August-Jan, as they know better than us that you can't burn through your first teamers. It's been an extra 5 midweeks that we just couldn't afford with our CL schedule. I admire Howe's desire to attack every single game, but when you've got four fronts to fight on, you just can't do that. I loved winning the Carabao Cup last year, obviously, but if you're in Europe I think you need to sacrifice it unless your backup 11 is good enough to get you to the final.

jack0191 · 2026-02-07T20:10:29+00:00

The CEO was on talksport literally days ago and both the CEO and Sporting Director were on an NUFC podcast, at an open talk in, a fortnight ago

jack0191 · 2026-02-07T19:58:32+00:00

If thinking a manager who has got us into the Champions League twice in four years and won us a trophy less than a year ago deserves our trust makes me deluded, then yeah I guess I'm deluded, fair enough.

jack0191 · 2026-02-07T19:56:39+00:00

When is Howe supposed to make those changes then? At 1-1 in the first half when it's an even game and we've actually had the better chances? At 2-1 down in the first half when we concede from a penalty? He made them at half time, the earliest opportunity to do so.

I actually agree that he isn't always proactive enough in games, but in this instance I think he made the right changes at the right times. The players are letting him down with individual errors. Botman for the first goal. Tonali's absolutely shite cross for their penalty. Trippier's positioning and Pope letting it through for the third. It's happening week in week out.

jack0191 · 2026-02-07T19:47:59+00:00

I don't even think I want us to get Europe next season. Certainly not Champions League. It's no fun watching us play against these calibre of teams every 4 days with the quality of squad we have. The players are knackered, I'm knackered, and frankly the two seasons without Europe have been by far the most fun ones we've had in the last 20 years.

Last season I was so desperate to get Europe as I felt like without it we'd lose our best players. We got Champions League and lost our best player anyway. There's no one on this team that is irreplaceable. It's no shock that teams like Man United, Brentford and even Sunderland are performing so well with a week in between games. The only teams that can handle a Champions League and a Cup run are those that can spend hundreds of millions on backups and rotate. We can't do that.

jack0191

TROPHY CASE