Magpies miss top team trademark Reds possess
EDDIE Howe’s eyes will have inevitably been drawn to the live game on the television at the back of the press room at Kenilworth Road. League leaders Arsenal were ahead against Liverpool as the Newcastle United boss faced the media, but by the time the team bus reached the airport, Jurgen Klopp’s team were already level.
That should not come as a surprise. Liverpool, after all, have recovered 19 points from losing positions in the Premier League this season, and the Reds even won at St James’ Park back in August despite being 1-0 down with just 10 minutes to go.
Liverpool have fallen behind in 10 top-flight fixtures in 2023-24 yet have only lost once and, even then, the nine-man visitors had a goal wrongfully disallowed by VAR in a 2-1 defeat at Spurs.
Liverpool’s resilience and strength in depth have been key to the Reds bouncing back after finishing four points behind Newcastle in the table last season.
Now, as we approach the halfway point of the current campaign, Liverpool are 10 points clear of the injuryravaged Magpies.
As immense as Newcastle have been at home, the shattered blackand-whites’ frailties on the road continue to cost them.
Six of Newcastle’s seven top-flight defeats this season have come away from home and, strangely, Howe’s team never truly looked like equalising at relegation-threatened Luton even with so much time to play following Andros Townsend’s goal midway through the first half.
“Last year there was a feeling that even if we conceded, we would potentially come back,” Howe told reporters after his side’s 1-0 defeat. “We were never out of any game and this season we haven’t had those comebacks.
“We haven’t won enough from losing positions and these are all the hallmarks of a really top team. That’s been a concern.
“There have been reasons behind that, but I don’t want to make excuses and we can’t live in that world. We have to change it ourselves with what we have available.”
There is no doubt that Newcastle have felt the effects of fatigue and a crippling absentee list to boot. However, you still have to go back to April for the last time Newcastle came from behind to win - both at home and on the road.
It said it all about Newcastle’s long-standing issues on their travels that when the Magpies recovered after going a goal down at West Ham to lead 2-1 in the dying minutes back earlier this season, the visitors still managed to drop two points at the death.
It is not an exaggeration to state that Newcastle would have got over the line in a similar situation last year when, in Howe’s own words, ‘it was not about the perfect performance - it was about grinding results out’. “We did that really well last year,” he said on Saturday. “We didn’t play brilliantly every week, but we went to some really tough grounds and got some valuable points.”
Remember how Newcastle bounced back from a one-goal deficit to win at Nottingham Forest thanks to Alexander Isak’s stoppagetime penalty? Or how two secondhalf goals in the space of eight minutes turned a tricky game at Brentford on its head after Newcastle went into the break 1-0 down? What about Allan Saint-Maximin’s 90thminute equaliser at Wolves? Even Miguel Almiron’s leveller at Bournemouth rescued a point that, remarkably, felt a bit of a disappointment at the time given the high standards Newcastle had set on their travels.
Newcastle have just not looked like staging similar comebacks when the visitors have gone behind on the road in the Premier League in recent weeks with Luton, Spurs, Everton and Bournemouth all winning rather comfortably.
To think, in the previous campaign, Newcastle had the third best away record in the division; now Howe’s team have the third worst.
You have to go back to October for the last time Newcastle even got a draw away from home in the Premier League and, digging deeper, the black-and-whites are just one goal shy of conceding as many goals on the road as they did in the whole of last season (19) in the top-flight.
After scoring 32 goals on the road in 2023-23, Newcastle have mustered 14 this term but eight of those strikes came in the Magpies’ one and only away win at Bramall Lane earlier this season.
Improving this poor away record simply has to be Newcastle’s New Year’s resolution.