Can we throttle the Throstles for four in a row?Venue: St James’ Park, Newcastle. Date: Sat 30th Nov, 2013. Kick off: 5.30pm. Referee: Phil Dowd. UK TV: Sky Sports 1.
Could we be celebrating four wins in a row this evening?
If the Magpies do manage to wrestle a juicy three point worm from the Throstles at tea time, it would be the first first time they have managed such a feat since March and April of 2012. Back then, they beat Norwich, this evening’s opponents, Liverpool, Swansea, Bolton and finally Stoke in a 6 match winning run, before finally succumbing to a 4-0 hammering at Wigan.
Although that was in the Spring before last, the side had an unseasonal 4-3-2-1 ‘Christmas Tree’ formation with a potent ‘delta force’ of Demba Ba, Papiss Cisse and Hatem Ben Arfa up front. During the West Brom game in that run I jokingly referred to Alan Pardew as ‘Alan Pardiola.’ The Guardian’s North East football correspondent, Louise Taylor, actually took me seriously and the phrase stuck amongst spme fans for a while. (more…)
‘Iron’ Mike: A defensive colossus?Despite the heroics of Tim Krul on Saturday, as well as those of other more ‘glamorous’ Newcastle United players such as Loic Remy, Yohan Cabaye etc throughout the season, if we look at the results both before and after he came into the team, it could be argued that Newcastle United’s most important player this season so far has been Mike Williamson.
After a couple of outings in the League Cup against Morecambe and Leeds, ‘Iron’ Mike was finally introduced to the club’s Premier League campaign as a half time substitute (for Mapou Yanga-Mbiwa) against Everton. This was after another disastrous first half display by the Magpie defence against Everton, with the club already 3-0 down. That was 5 1/2 games into the season and as Newcastle United have now played 11, with Williamson on the pitch for exactly the same time as he has been off it in Premier League games, I thought it would be a good time to look at the staistics for Newcastle United with and without Williamson.
The difference has been obvious watching the games with a transformed back four. Even in that Everton game alone, the bleeding was staunched immediately with Newcastle keeping a clean sheet in the second half, giving them a platform to go on and stage a comeback with two goals, though, alas, it wasn’t quite enough on that occasion. (more…)
NUFC Blog on metro.co.ukMy latest blog on metro.co.uk is now published.
In my last piece on there I looked at Yohan Cabaye and Mike Williamson, and specifically, their perfomance against Liverpool in our last game. In this one however, I take a look at a player who was relegated to the bench in that game, Papiss Cisse. In the wake of his recent struggle for goals, I take a look at what Alan Pardew can do to help the Senegalese hitman get back on the scoresheet as often as he used to for Newcastle United.
Originally, it had the same title as this piece, however it is now called:
Yohan Cabaye: A man of the match performance.My latest blog on metro.co.uk was published yesterday.
Usually I would just write a few words about it and post a link. However, I am getting so sick of them being hacked to pieces by trainee Metro sub-eds that I have now decided to publish the original version on here, complete with the original title.
If you like, you can see the butchered version on the metro here.
Key performance #1: Yohan Cabaye.
The fleet-footed Frenchman was the fulcrum of Newcastle United’s midfield on Saturday, and was at the heart of most things for Newcastle United in attack.
Besides scoring a brilliant goal in the 23rd minute, he also provided the great set piece which led to Paul Dummett’s goal in the 56th. Of course, the Magpies’ set pieces have been the focus of much criticism in recent times and rightly so when you look at the amount of goals scored by this method over the last season or two. Although it could be said that Aly Sissokho made things slightly easier than he could have for the second goal, Cabaye’s free kick was excellent, and the way Dummett exploited this with a true poacher’s instinct was superb, remarkably so for such a young, inexperienced player who is supposed to be a defender rather than a striker. But I digress… (more…)
Confused Cardiff fans (thanks to Mike at Urban75.com).Venue: Cardiff City Stadium, Cardiff. Date: Sat 5th Oct, 2013. Kick off: 3.00pm. Referee: Kevin Friend (Leics). UK TV: None.
No matter what Alan Pardew or the club say, the sharks have started to circle around Alan Pardew now, and if the Magpies lose this one we could well be be seeing a Sky Sports sacking special live from St James’ Park before long. If he wins, it will be a case of Pardew on probation, but the club will then face a nightmare series of games against four of the Premier League’s top clubs, ie Liverpool, Sunderland (ok, maybe not them!), Man City, Chelsea and Tottenham. Poor Pardew, it might be a good idea for him to have Noda Cabs on speed dial?
If it does happen, it can’t be said that it is a huge overreaction to a handful of disappointing result as it was with his predecessor, Chris Hughton. As site reader ‘tunyc’ rightly pointed out on these pages yesterday (I checked), if we look at Pardew’s Premier League record over the last twelve months it has been P38, W11, D6, L21. That’s a shocking total of only 39 points from a season’s worth of games, with a Goal Difference of -27 and a win percentage of only 28.95%.(more…)
