Scored but shoulda been wearing a balaclava...The scoreline doesn’t even begin to tell the story, on a day when Newcastle United were outplayed and outfought by a Swansea City side, more determined and far more capable than their Magpie counterparts. And how we manged to nick a point at the death will remain a mystery to those who sat and watched the full 90 minutes.
With a number of injuries to contend with and still bedding in new recruits, Hughton nonetheless fielded a strong side against the Swans, with three changes from the Derby game. Colo came in for Williamson to partner Fitz Hall. Gutierrez didn’t even make the bench, allegedly due to an illness, with Smudger back in the middle of the park and Guthrie moving to the left. Leon Best was dropped for Lovenkrands and Hughton seemed to go for a 4-4-2 from where I was sitting, though Sky kept insisting it was a 4-5-1. (more…)
Cyril, the Swansea City mascot.A 700 mile round trip faces the Toon Army for tomorrow’s televised game at the Liberty Stadium, when 5th place Swansea City take on Newcastle United with an undecently early 12.45pm kick off.
This will certainly be a stern test for the lads, as Paulo Sousa’s team play good football and are unbeaten in their last four home games. They are strong defensively, and following our 3-0 defeat at the hands of Derby County midweek, they now have the same number of goals conceeded as us. However, all is not perfect as the strikers, or in fact anyone else having a go don’t seem to have much luck finding the target with only a paltry 26 goals scored in 29 matches. Only bottom club Plymouth have scored less.
The last time the two teams met at Swansea City was amazingly over twenty years ago, with Newcastle Utd. beating the Swans 2-1 in a second division match. Since that time Swansea have moved to a new 20,500 capacity stadium, and more recently have earned a reputation as a decent footballing side. That was evident under previous manager Roberto Martinez and has carried on with their current boss, another good young manager in the making Paulo Sousa. (more…)
Your destination - Swansea City's Liberty Stadium.Next up on the road for The Toon is a potentially tricky trip to Swansea for our Saturday lunchtime match against The Swans. Newcastle will undoubtedly be wanting to bounce back after Tuesdays 3-0 defeat at Derby County, and what better way to do it than winning away at a promotion chasing team in front of live Sky TV cameras!
The Liberty Stadium is a new ground, opened within the last 5 years. It’s a ground I’ve yet to visit, although I do know where it is, so some parts of this won’t be from personal experience but will be from people I know that have been there for the football.
The journey.
Before I start I must warn that potentially there could be a lot of problems travelling down, particularly around Cardiff as there is a Rugby match on at the Millenium Stadium that kicks off at 2pm. Add to that several strecthes of notoriously bad roadworks and some bad weather forecasts and those who do travel could be in for some long waits. I’d advise setting out earlier to give you some breathing space time-wise! (more…)
