You just can’t please some people… | OneFootball

I know some Newcastle United fans have always been like this.

However, it is getting ever worse.

They may only be a minority but they are a very vocal and seemingly growing one.

Newcastle United fans who are far too influenced by the media.

Newcastle United fans who dig themselves an ever deeper hole of negativity that they find impossible to climb out of.

So they just keep digging deeper and deeper!

History has been rewritten.

We are now supposed to think of the opening game of this season as not something positive.

The media and the Newcastle United fans I am speaking of, only wanting to point out how despite playing at home against a promoted team, Newcastle struggled to create many chances nor have much of the ball, with Southampton having more shots and so on.

When the media and these fans are quoting these various stats about that Southampton match, or including them in a wider set to stats with other Newcastle matches, they ‘forget’ to mention that United went down to 10 men when it was goalless early on, then played another 73 minutes and kept a clean sheet, as well as a winning goal!

I then want to fast forward to these last two matches before the break, against Man City and Everton.

For me, these were excellent performances overall, a definite step up on some of the other matches so far.

I don’t think anybody has said the Newcastle performance against Man City was poor, however, I have seen a lot of emphasis from the media and some Newcastle United fans in terms of saying this was a lot more to do with how under par Pep Guardiola’s side were.

I think this does a massive disservice to Eddie Howe and his players who I thought were brilliant.

Every aspect of the performance and the tactics/set-up was immaculate.

Manchester City are a brilliant team and yet when Newcastle United stopped them playing their normal game for much of the match and made a canny few chances of our own, it was just due to the away side not performing…

This was simply because NUFC played so well.

The last time Manchester City lost a Premier League match was 6 December 2023 and they could easily have done so against Newcastle at SJP the other Saturday.

Since March 2024 Man City have never failed to score at least two goals in a Premier League match, apart from the one where Erling Haaland came up against Dan Burn.

Their 16 Premier League matches since March, have seen Man City win 14 and draw two, the other draw against Arsenal. They scored one in that Newcastle United match but 49 in those other 15!

As for the Everton match, yes it was frustrating we didn’t get the goals the team deserved BUT that doesn’t change the fact it was still a very good performance overall.

I keep reading about how ‘poor’ Newcastle United played.

We didn’t!

People are hiding behind the scoreline.

The underlying performance and stats were excellent.

As the away team, Newcastle United had 10 corners and Everton none at all, Newcastle 42 touches in the opposition box, Everton only 12. Newcastle 68% possession and Everton only 32%.

In their other three PL home matches, Everton have lost 3-0 to Everton, lost 3-2 to Bournemouth and won 2-1 against Palace.

The stats in those three games saw:

Against Brighton – Everton 38% possession v 62%, 1 corner v 5, 18 touches in opposition box v 29.

Against Bournemouth – Everton 47% possession v 53%, 8 corners v 4, 37 touches in opposition box v 28.

Against Palace – Everton 40% possession v 60%, 5 corners v 8, 16 touches in opposition box v 31.

As you can see, none of the underlying stats in those games, come anywhere close to how much Newcastle dominated Everton.

If Newcastle had put their chances away, this would have been seen a totally dominant victory.

The fact we didn’t put those goals on top of it, does NOT mean it wasn’t still a very good display in so many ways.