So who fancies living up to this then?Well here it is, the third and final chapter of my mid-term player review. And a topical area for discussion, as speculation remains over a move for Leeds Utd’s Jermaine Beckford, or A.N. Other should we fail in that bid.
The No.9 shirt is almost as synonymous with Newcastle United, as St James’ Park, the black and white stripes or that deed funny accent we’ve got. It’s been made particularly special in this part of the world because it’s been worn by some of the best players this country has seen. The likes of Gallacher, Milburn, MacDonald, Cole, Shearer have graced that shirt and it will undoubtedly always be a big shirt to fill.
Ironic then, given that the No.9 shirt and the prestige it carries with it is currently up for grabs, that we have a group of strikers who fall somewhat short of the standards we’ve come to expect from our centre-floorboards, and that none of them look like earning that honour just yet, particularly in this current barren spell…..
Pick that one out...If you asked me at half-time if I’d be happy with a repeat of the first half after the break, we’d have walked away with three points following a 2-0 victory and I would have been bemoaning the obvious lack of quality in our side once again. As it was, the scoreline was the same and the manner in which we won was far from convincing. But following the early second half dismissal of Kevin Nolan, this result held an awful lot more satisfaction than it might have, and proved once again that winning is a good habit to be in.
Having started with the same eleven as we did against Swansea, we started brightly enough although our defence seemed less than sure of itself this week. Despite a number of scares, including a goalline clearance from Steven Taylor, we took the lead on 20 minutes after Harewood had blocked the keeper’s clearance and Lovenkrands was left with a straightforward tap-in to make it 1-0. (more…)
Sideshow Bob: "A real class defender" says Hughton.Newcastle United manager, Chris Hughton, has been giving ’nuff respect to more players on nufcTV. This time, Hughton’s effusive praise has been heaped upon the two Fabs, Colloccini and Pancrate, and a back in the goals Peter Lovenkrands.
Lovenkrands hailed.
First to be showered with praise was recently troubled Dane, Lovenkrands, who has struggled with family illness and a lack of full match fitness in the last few months. On the Great Dane, Hughton gushed:
“He gives us that pace up the middle and is a great outlet,”
On his goalscoring performance in the Swansea game, he effused:
“I thought he coped with the 90 minutes tremendously well given the fact it was his first game for a while.
“He was full of running towards the end and that’s testament to his hard work.
“He got a good goal and it was a great assist for Marlon.
“That performance will lift him and I thought overall he was excellent.”(more…)
Harewood: Getting stronger all the time.Newcastle United manager, Chris Hughton seems to be very pleased with the progress of rusty on loan hitman, Marlon Harewood after his two goals against Swansea City yesterday.
Harewood, who saw virtually no first team action at Villa this season before arriving on loan, and missed most of pre-season through injury, has been marked out as a target by Newcastle United’s contingent of boo boys as he has struggled to regain full match fitness, though his two goals yesterday will probably shut the petulant, imbecillic section of the crowd up for a while.
On Harewood’s struggle, and his performance yesterday, Hughton declared:
“He missed a big chunk of pre-season at Aston Villa through injury, but he’s getting stronger all the time.(more…)
Two goals and two fingers!Seems like everybody was expecting a tight if tidy affair at St James’ today and with two of the meanest defences in the division, a high-soring game wasn’t on the cards. But with barely a third of the game gone, Newcastle were three goals to the good and showboating as some of the travelling contingent headed for early beers.
Expectations were high that Swansea would prove to be a well-organised and competent football team, particularly stingy at the back but a new-look forward line of Peter Lovenkrands and Marlon Harewood put paid to that theory within half an hour of the kick-off, and Swansea looked like just another fairly average Championship side. Eeh that Marlon Harewood, eh? I always knew he just needed time to settle in…
Harewood’s first came from a bouncing ball in the box and with the defence hesitant he headed the ball in the net to make it 1-0. After some good build up play on the left, Gutierrez finally managed to do what we have been crying out for him to do and delivered perfectly with his left, so that Lovenkrands had the simplest of headers to make it 2-0 with 21 minutes gone. And before we’d reached the thirty minute mark, more good work on the left and and an almost identical cross from Lovenkrands and a similar finish from Harewood and the game looked to be beyond the Welsh side at 3-0. (more…)
