Most of what has gone wrong this season can be put down to poor recruitment – but the manager must share the blame
E
ven when the fixture list was revealed last summer, it was perhaps predictable that the middle of March would represent the crisis point for Newcastle. If they had reached the Champions League quarter-finals and won the Tyne-Wear derby at St James’ Park, a lot of other frustrations could have been forgotten. Even better, that game against Sunderland would have had to be postponed had Newcastle reached a third Carabao Cup final since 2023.
Those days of celebration a year ago feel a long time ago now, but the mood could easily have been very different. Newcastle were the better side in the home leg against Barcelona in the last 16 of the Champions League. Only the concession of a daft late penalty denied them victory and they were a persistent threat on the break in the first half of the away leg. Only in the second half of the second leg did the game get away from them: a 7-2 defeat made the difference between the sides seem much greater than it actually was.
The derby, similarly, might easily have been won. Newcastle led at half-time and had hit a post. But they have the fifth-worst second-half record of any Premier League side this season, raising questions about their fitness. Sunderland came back, Brian Brobbey’s winner resulting from a straightforward pass from Granit Xhaka. There are not many similarities between Hansi Flick’s Barça and Régis Le Bris’s Sunderland but both capitalised on surprising space in the Newcastle midfield late in the game.
