We are top of the league!
Posted on August 18th, 2010 | 211 Comments |
Funny old world isn’t it? Last season we pretty much breezed through the season picking up relatively few injuires along the way. Strange considering we were used to having a pretty full treatment room in the Premier League.
But our return to Premier League action has signalled more than just the return of trips to Manchester United, Arsenal, Liverpool and Chelsea, it has brought with it a return to our usual spot at the top of the injury league table.
For a good few years now, Newcastle fans have had to bemoan the fact that injuries seemed to strike us more than other teams. Time and time again, the same offenders were repeatedly ruled out. Michael Owen and Marcelino spring to mind as probably two of our worst culprits for missing games, although there have been more than just those two in fairness.
Luckily it seems that our stint at the top of the table is about to come to an end. The return to fitness of Danny Guthrie and Peter Lovenkrands should see Arsenal take over top spot in the league whilst Newcastle slip down to joint second in the table.
These injury statistics have been inflated by the signature of Dan Gosling who is of course injured until sometime in the new year, but we also have Leon Best, Tamas Kadar, Steven Taylor and Danny Simpson on the sidelines currently, aswell as Sol Campbell, who isn’t injured as such and is just lacking in fitness.
Granted, this is a fairly tongue in cheek kind of article, but it does highlight just how fragile our squad is, and how a bad run of injuries can turn our team from a one that should survive to one that could survive. It also highlights the need for new signings in certain areas as if we lose someone like Jose Enrique then we could be in trouble with no dedicated cover for him.
Hopefully this is our ‘injury crisis’. Most teams go through one at some point in the season so I am kind of hoping that we are getting our injuroes out of the way early.
Touch wood, we have!
Pathetic. Let’s see, Gosling and Campbell; brilliant signings aren’t they? Of course, most sides would want to recruit players who can play. Not us, we prefer those who are unavailable. Was Hughton a scout?