Keano’s Tractor Boys crushed by Scouse juggernaut. Toon 4 – 0 Ipswich.
Posted on September 27th, 2009 | 54 Comments |
On the game itself, Merseyside hit squad, Kevin Nolan and Ryan Taylor came up trumps once again as Newcastle United eventually cruised to a 4 – 0 win at Portman Road, including a debut hat-trick for Nolan. Though there were times when he looked like a certain number 9 as he combined opportunism, strength, and good finishing, Ipswich certainly made it alot easier than it should have been with some pretty awful defending at times. This gave Toon in general, and Nolan particular more than enough space to play the game that they wanted. Ryan Taylor also added to the total with a superbly taken free kick for the third, along with some excellent mortar fire, creating several opportunities around the Ipswich goal.
Ipswich’s attack was pretty awful too generally. Being seemingly terrified to crack one off in the box, they had very few chances overall. The midfield were poor too, though perhaps not quite as bad as the rest, they were bullied by a no nonsense Magpie mid section full of enforcers including captain, Alan ‘Slasher’ Smith, who wasted no time rolling his sleeves up and getting stuck into some raw meat as usual.
However, in the first half hour, before the first goal went in on around 29 minutes, it seemed like it might have been a slightly different game. Though Newcastle were nearly always domninant overall, Ipswich seemed to be completely deflated by the first strike, a Nolan header off a Ryan Taylor free kick. From that point, the Magpies then proceeded to rip Town apart like a juicy worm, with two further goals from the Merseyside assassins in four or five minutes of pure blitzkrieg. Less than two minutes after the first goal, Nolan struck again, connecting with a nice Carroll lob and taking advantage of more space generously provided by the Ipswich defence. Another beatifully taken Taylor free kick shortly after that did not require Nolan’s head this time, sailing just beyond the reach of Ipswich goalkeeper Richard Wright from around 25 yards.
In the second half, Ipswich had a bit of a ‘second wind’, no doubt after a bit of a talking to from Roy Keane in the dressing room. However it didn’t last for long, less than five minutes in fact. Nolan once again knocked the stuffing out of them as he completed his first hat-trick in the 50th minute. Young prospect, Nile Ranger, also had a good headed chance from a buildup including new Georgian, Zurab Khizanishvili. He charged down the flank and laid off to the seemingly omnipresent Ryan Taylor, who in turn picked up a sloppily marked Ranger in the area, forcing a good save from the Ipswich ‘keeper.
By this stage of course, the match was a formality, and manager, Chris Hughton decided to save some key legs and give some others a bit of experience, most notably, new on loan battering ram, Marlon Harewood. He took the chance to do a bit of gentle settling in, and showed bit of something to look forward to one occaision when he casually brushed off two Ipswich defenders to have a stab at Wright’s goal. Although as mentioned previously, they weren’t having the best of days though, and didn’t offer him too much resistance.
Other notes:
Carroll, like sub, Ranger, had a decent, though ultimately fruitless spell at the cutting edge, providing good support for the midfield hit squad. Zurab Khizanishvili also looks like a good loan move on Hughton’s part.
Toon made quite a strong defensive performance, however it wasn’t perfect against frankly toothless opposition. There were some instances of slight over eloboration close to goal from the more ‘continental’ style defenders, Enrique and Coloccini. But to their credit, they recovered from their mistakes admirably, and Enrique has undoubtedly been a real asset to the squad in recent times, including in this game. Collocini continues to settle in a more forgiving division and seems to be much better in the air recently, possibly using his mighty perm to lash opponents into submission and obscure their vision? :-)
Teams
Newcastle United
1) Harper, 16) R Taylor (Donaldson 78), 13) Khizanishvili, 2) Coloccini (Lovendkrands 68), 3) Enrique, 27) S Taylor, 22) Butt, 4) Nolan 30) Ranger (Harewood 65) 17) Smith 24) Carroll.
Ipswich Town
1) Wright, 15) Balkestein, 22) Rosenior, 5) Bruce, 17) Colback, 6) Leadbitter, 23) Edwards, 36) Trotter, 3) Delaney, 19) Walters, 16) Priskin.
Referee: M.Jones.
Venue / Attendance: Portman Road, Ipswich. 27,059.
NUFCBlog Author: workyticket
workyticket has written 1096 articles on this blog.
Highlights for me were:
The tributes to Sir Bobby Robson
Putting a smile on Sir Alan Shearer’s face as he was able to wax lyrical as a studio pundit about his beloved United
4 cracking goals and a very professional performance
Seeing Ranger and Carroll up front – the future!
Getting a result like this with only 10 men – cos Butt was crap as usual
The chant after the second and third goals of “you fat cockney B@rstard, get out of our club…..
The “Shearer give us a wave” chant…..