There was a moment in the loss at Brentford when even some fans who would describe themselves as ‘Happy Clappers’ or ‘Loyalists’ had their faith in Eddie Howe shaken. When Dan Burn got his marching orders for giving away a penalty that led to the second goal in the 3-1 defeat, it was a moment when a manager - whose mistakes have been outweighed by the things he’s gotten right over the past few seasons - dropped a clanger when he needed it least.

In the aftermath of the defeat, more than a few fair-minded, level-headed fans slid into my DMs with: ‘I think it might be Howe’s last season.’ That result. That performance. And the one the week before at West Ham. Those were the games that were meant to tell us where we actually were in the pecking order this season.

Those two games were not just bad afternoons. They were part of a wider pattern that has been building across the start of the season, which Howe himself would describe as not good enough. This piece is not about picking a scapegoat. It is about looking at what has changed, what has stayed the same, pinpointing the reasons behind the changes, and what that tells us about where Newcastle United are right now.

What does the team’s performance data show?

Regular readers of this newsletter will be used to visualisations of player or team data to highlight changes in performances or play styles, and my custom Style of Play radar vis is a useful starting point for this analysis.

In the radar chart below, data from the 24/25 season 🔵 compared with the 11 games from the 25/26 🔴 season so far highlights that Newcastle are:

1. Generating 0.50 less Expected Goals (xG) and taking two fewer shots overall per game

2. Still generating a high amount of shots as a result of high pressing

3. Not creating as many shots in open play

4. Not creating as many counter-attacking shots

5. Are kicking the ball longer from Goal Kicks and moving the ball towards the opposition goal at a similar pace

6. Conceding fewer chances in defence overall (despite the last 2 games)

7. Conceding more counter-attacking shots

To anyone that has watched a lot of Newcastle United this season. There not much here regsiters as a surprise, especially in attack, which has looked disjointed, underbaked and has relied on set pieces/high press shots to stay afloat.

Take a closer look at the teams Attacking metrics this season 🔴 vs. last 🔵 and you see there’s more than a little tinkering needed to get things firing on all cylinders again. Not only has our shot volume decreased by nearly two shots a game, but average quality of each chance we’ve taken to shoot is down by just under third, with our xG per shot dipping to 0.08 from 0.11.

Fewer shots at from statistically worse opportunities to score is a horrific combo that signals that the underlying health of the attack needs to be addressed. For those of you who see the xG numbers and whose brain goes…

Here’s a better visual representation of how this maps to the pitch itself. Below you can see a map of all of the shots that Newcastle United have taken this season. With 10 open play goals from nearly 11 expected, we’re about on track for the season so far. Look at the density of shots from medium range in the red box.

Now compare this to the entirety of last season. While you’d expect this area to fill out as the season rumbles on, the lack of mid-range shots (and the subsequent shots that follow scuffed efforts, blocked shots, palmed GK saves, etc) needs to be addressed.

The issue is so bad that the attack is creating chances at its worst rate at any point under any full season with Howe in charge. Below you can see a 10-game rolling average of Newcastle’s xG for 🟢 and against 🟣. While there are always some fluctuations here as players/the team go in and out of form, we need to find the half-a-goal’s worth of daylight between the quality of chances created vs. conceded so that we’re not relying on the defence to be perfect and winning a 50:50 coin flip to win games.

Occasionally on social, I get people who insist that xG doesn’t matter, so here’s a little more evidence as to why it does and why clubs at all levels of the game across the world use it to help guide their decision-making.

Here is another 10-game rolling average of xG difference 🟢 and actual goal difference 🟣 compared to one another. While there are gaps where the team goes on a finishing hot streak (can you spot Almiron’s purple patch?), the two metrics show a strong relationship to one another.

Take a look at this season so far, you can see we’re behind our goal difference generally this season, which is scant comfort when you’re just above the relegation zone, but hints that with a tiny bit of a fairer wind, we would already have a few more points on the board.

Why is Newcastle’s attack misfiring?

So what has happened to turn the league’s 4th most potent attack (1.46xG per game) in 24/25, morphed into the league’s 7th worst () in a matter of months?

Well, like most things in life and football, it’s never just one thing, but if you nailed me to a steel table and threatened to kill me like or Scorpio unless I committed to one, I’d say: “It’s growing pains of replacing Isak with Woltemade.”

While obviously, as fans we ALL love that Big Nick Energy and have fallen out with the Striker from Sweden, they are markedly different types of strikers. They bring different qualities to the role of being a central striker within Newcastle United’s typical 4-3-3 system.

It was something I highlighted in my newsletter about the German forward when he signed.

Woltemade’s tendency to drop towards the ball and play with his back to goal will change the nature of Howe’s attack. Woltemade’s strength and outstanding ability to pin defenders give Newcastle United a new type of platform to build attacks from.

This change means there will be a greater onus on combination passes ⚫ into Woltemade’s feet, with Isak’s threat in behind being provided by passes 🔵 into the spaces defenders are forced to leave as they attempt to get close to the giant German.

Ideally, Howe and co. would’ve had a full pre-season’s worth of sessions before flipping the switch on such a big change to the attacking dynamics of the team. There’s an alternate reality in which Yoane Wissa doesn’t pick up a serious knee injury and the growing pains of reshaping our attack around Woltemade’s qualities happen on the training pitches rather than in Premier League games, but we’re not living in it.

To highlight just how starkly different this is, here’s a heatmap of where Isak received the ball for Newcastle United in the Premier League last season.

Now compare this to Woltemade for Howe’s team after 7.5 games worth of minutes.

The impact of Woltemade’s receiving the ball deep, laying it off, and finishing the attack style dramatically changes the in-possession identity built over more than three seasons at Newcastle. An identity, which at least in part relied on its strikers (Isak and Wilson), to offer a last-line threat and turn defences with runs in behind, now has to find a new way to attack.

It’s a change that disrupts our attacking patterns of play in buildup, transition and against set defences.

A change that means the instinctive habits built over those three seasons: when and where to give the ball, when and where to make a supporting run, which passing lanes or percentage balls will come off, now work against players who need an extra moment to process the picture in front of them, or fall into old habits when their legs are tired.

You can see this most acutely in where the wingers are getting involved with play., Now tasked with getting beyond Woltemade to offer a threat in behind, they’re dropping deep less often to get involved in build (see 🔵 square) and are more active centrally in transition and set attacking situations (see 🔴 square).

For Gordon in particular, finding himself in more congested and central spaces is hurting his ability to get away shots. His shot volume this season has dropped to 1.3 shots per 90 from open play compared to 2.5 in 24/25 and 23/24.

The same trends are observable with Murphy, who is also not as involved in the buildup and drifting infield more often.

When you factor in injuries at full-back that have pushed the manager into playing two 33-year-olds, Burn and Trippier, two or three times a week, just at the time when you’re asking more from the position, it’s a less-than-ideal mix. Burn and Trippier are fine professionals, but both struggle in their own ways to meet the physical demands of any version of the role in Howe’s team.

Generally, Murphy has managed to adjust better than any of Newcastle’s wingers to date, shooting more often this season 🔴, which, as these things tend to do, has impacted his league-leading creation numbers from last term 🔵.

Variations on these themes are observable across Newcastle’s in-possession play. At times, I’ve seen Guimaraes and Joelinton pulling wide to help progress the ball up the wings, though generally it’s asked of Joelinton more.

At the centre of this sea of change, we have Woltemade himself, who has become something of a cult figure on Tyneside already and probably won goal of the season for his flicked finish down at Brighton.

However, for all the moments of quality and the moments where he’s added 4 goals and an assist across just 7.5 games worth of minutes in terms of replacing Isak’s threat and output, he’s not even close at the moment, especially when it comes to raw shot counts.

While he’s actually picking his shots pretty well and has taken a couple of very nice headers, he’s simply not getting enough of them at the moment.

This example vs. Brentford, which was shared with me by Jake Armstrong (Follow him on X | Bluesky) is an encapsulation of where the team is at the moment. It has an idea of how it wants to play, but it’s struggling to execute with any source of consistency, and we’re not seeing it often enough to breed confidence that there feels like a plan.

This is compounded by the really poor performances in the games vs. West Ham and Brentford, where we felt lightweight and second best in all areas of the game. The physicality of the team didn’t feel right.

Now, whether that’s the result of the schedule, the illness doing the rounds in the camp, or trotting out two aging full-backs or something more fundamental about Howe’s ability to motivate the group, only time will tell. But my money isn’t on Howe’s ability being the issue.

Even though it’s not happening often enough right now, when the parts of the attacking plan do click, the vision of what the attack is attempting becomes clear.

The defence is strong but vulnerable to game state changes

With the attack so disjointed, opposition teams are using it to their advantage. Because Newcastle are not consistently finding ways to release runners beyond Woltemade, and with the German international unable to stretch the pitch himself, opponents are squeezing the game vertically and giving Newcastle less room to play, which only exacerbates the issues in attack.

As attacks continue to break down more often, possession is handed over cheaply, and the defence comes under more pressure more often. If you keep inviting this pressure, the need to be perfect or lucky to preserve even a point becomes more acute. No margin for error when it comes to substitutions (Howe vs. Brentford), Goalkeeping (Pope vs. West Ham/Brentford), or simple bad luck (Burn’s block vs. Brighton landing straight to Welbeck).

Generally, Newcastle’s defence this season 🔴 looks pretty similar to last season 🔵

I know a recent Adam Cleary video (which is really worth watching) suggested that because Newcastle recorded a low amount of tackles in the final third, that we were struggling to force turnovers high up the field, and that’s not what Hudl Statsbomb data is telling me.

I won’t bore you with the concept of what is and what isn’t a tackle in football data speak, but let’s just say that Gordon’s pressing/tackling on his own has forced 19 possession changes in the opposition’s final third.

So, despite giving up 6 goals vs. West Ham and Brentford, fundamentally, I don’t think Newcastle have huge issues on this side of the ball yet.

What they do have an issue with, especially when they’re chasing a win or trying to rescue a draw, is the balance in how they go about it. Perhaps as an attempt to overcompensate for the lack of attacking threat more generally, Newcastle have conceded nearly half of their goals this season from the 80th minute onwards.

Whether that’s a problem with Howe’s high-intensity game model being able to cope with 3 games a week, or simply down to chasing game state (whether the team are winning, losing or drawing) it’s probably too early in the season to say. Howe has already shown this season a willingness to manage minutes and swap out half the team in the Carabao Cup in order to keep legs fresh. We’ll know more by the end of January when any integration issues surrounding Woltemade carry less weight.

Before we wrap, one last thing about Nick is that while he may not have the burst of Isak, his work rate without the ball trumps Isak’s so far. He’s forced turnovers in possession 37 times in the opposition half and made 8 tackles. You can see his defensive activity volume visualised below.

For comparison, here’s Isak’s from the entirety of last season. If I can indulge myself in a little Isak-hating, after just 7.5 games, Big Nick only needs another 5 tackles to match Isak’s total from 24/25.

Conclusions - What does this mean for Howe?

So far, this isn’t a crisis of belief or effort. It’s a team remoulding its attack around a forward learning the ropes in a new division, and paying the price in real time. The defence is good enough to keep games alive, but not good enough to carry an attack that is only firing in spurts.

You can call it growing pains if you like, but the attacking numbers right now suggest a “mid-table” finish far more than they say “Europe” or “Champions League”. That’s the reality, not a Twitter overreaction. It’s on Howe, the staff and the players to sort out, and it has to happen soon.

For me, it’s nowhere near bad enough to sack the manager. That would be a knee-jerk reaction to some poor league form, and I honestly don’t think many managers would find instant solutions in the short term. Generally, where you land on the “Howe Out” scale probably comes down to whether you see this as entirely Howe’s fault or simply the roughest part of transitioning into a post-Isak team. For now, I’m firmly in the second camp.

But when Wissa is back to help manage the transition and the full-backs are available again, if we don’t see an uptick in results and performances, and we’re still watching the same thing by the end of February, the conversation will be different.

After a summer of failed attempts to land a striker, Newcastle United have signed 23-year-old German international striker Nick Woltemade (Vol-tuh-mar-duh) from VfB Stuttgart in a club record £69m deal.

Let’s look at what the 6’6” striker, nicknamed "Wolte-Messi", will bring to St James’ Park.

Background

Born in Bremen in 2002, Woltemade came through Werder Bremen’s academy and became their youngest-ever Bundesliga debutant in February 2020.

However, it was a loan spell at SV Elversberg in 2022-23, where he scored 10 goals, helped secure promotion, and was named 3. Liga Player of the Season, which jump-started his career.

Following a season coming off the bench at Bremen, Woltemade moved to VfB Stuttgart on a free transfer.

Having started the 24/25 season from the bench, Woltemade eventually broke into the first team, generally as the left-side striker in a front two, where he scored 17 goals & 3 assists across 2,138 mins (23.8 90s), helping the club to a DFB-Pokál triumph.

This form was enough to raise his profile within the German international teams, and Woltemade finished his 24/25 season as top scorer at the 2025 U21 Euros before making his senior Germany debut later in the summer.

Performances at VfB Stuttgart

This rapid ascension into VfB Stuttgart’s first team, his first senior appearances for Germany, has now been capped by a blockbuster transfer to Newcastle, a fairytale season.

But what is it about his game that convinced VfB Stuttgart and now Newcastle United that such an inexperienced player was worth the risk?

Well, to put it mildly, Woltemade has a unique profile for a striker. Despite being the sort of size you’d normally associate with a ‘target man’, Woltemade’s 🔴 playstyle has more in common with Alexander Isak 🔵 than your typical big guy up top.

As such, I intend to compare and contrast Woltemade’s with Isak’s as I will break down the traits, weaknesses and strengths in his game, which include:

1. 🙋‍♂️ Dropping deep to link-up play

2. 🏃‍♂️ High-level dribbling ability

3. 🤝 Creating chances for teammates

4. 🎯 Controlled finishing

5. 🤕 Inconsistent aerial threat

🙋‍♂️ Dropping deep to link-up play

Let’s start with a fairly obvious difference between Isak and Woltemade: how their athleticism influences the off-ball runs they make.

Isak’s underlying speed and skill made him a truly complete forward. He comes short, turns to dribble at the defence and runs in behind/the channels with equal effectiveness. It’s just one of the reasons Liverpool made him one of the most expensive transfers of all time.

Woltemade doesn’t have Isak’s acceleration and speed. While he’s not exactly slow, he’s hurting defences with high volumes of runs in behind or the channels. Instead, when played as a lone striker, Woltemade will drop off to primarily receive the ball centrally.

Woltemade’s ability to generate enough space between the lines to make him a viable passing option is genuinely up there with the best in the Bundesliga and one of the most interesting things about his profile.

Of all players in the 24/25 Bundesliga season, Woltemade ranked 3rd for Line Breaking Passes received (13.43 per 90), he was 2nd highest in the opposition half (10.56) and 3rd in the final third too.

He recorded more touches in the box (10.62 per 90) than any other player in the division and only famed Raumdeuter (roughly translates to “Space Investigator”) Thomas Müller matched him consistently across these metrics.

Woltemade’s tendency to drop towards the ball and play with his back to goal will change the nature of Howe’s attack. Woltemade’s strength and outstanding ability to pin defenders give Newcastle United a new type of platform to build attacks from 🔽

This change means there will be a greater onus on combination passes ⚫ into Woltemade’s feet, with Isak’s threat in behind being provided by passes 🔵 into the spaces defenders are forced to leave as they attempt to get close to the giant German.

While Woltemade’s chance creation numbers for teammates are very good (more on that later), his passing is an area of his game that needs to be developed and where his lack of experience shows.

In particular, he struggles with medium/long range passes 🟣 primarily because he often doesn’t put quite enough juice on them…🔽

Because of his tendency not to hit passes with pace, our expected passing model rates him just below average across the board. Having watched a lot of his buildup play now, it’s not a huge issue, but it’s an area where Howe’s coaching can take him to a new level.

So while he does do some target man-like things, it’s better to think of Woltemade as a deep-lying forward. A high-functioning facilitator that knits attacks together that might otherwise break down with a less technically able footballer.

🏃‍♂️ High-level dribbling ability

Normally, men of Woltemade’s size can be somewhat predictable for defenders, but any defender who gets too tight or backs off too much will find out why his nickname of “Wolte-Messi” is well earned, because his dribbling and technical ability are sensational.

It’s not just good for a “man of his size”, it’s just good full stop. Woltemade attempted to dribble past his man 2.72 times per 90 last season, completing 56% of them, with 8 successful take-ons in the box in just under 20 league games of minutes.

When it comes to carrying the ball, Woltemade tends to look to move the ball to more rapid players to lead counterattacks before rejoining the attack as it reaches its completion rather than travelling long distances with the ball himself.

While I expect that at Newcastle, Woltemade will be encouraged to carry the ball more vertically by Howe. I still think he’ll look for combinations that allow Elanga, Gordon or Ramsey to lead counters before arriving late in the box to complete the move. Either way, it’ll be fun to watch.

🤝 Creating chances for teammates

As you can see from the clips above, Woltemade’s ability to dribble out of the tightest of spaces affords him opportunities to play dangerous passes to teammates.

While he recorded 2️⃣ assists in the Bundesliga last season, he created 35 shots worth 4.35xG 🔽

But even this doesn’t tell a full story; across all players in the Bundesliga, Woltemade managed to complete more passes inside the box per 90 (1.21) than every other player in the league, beaten again by Müller.

With better quality teammates, the chances of Woltemade increasing the number of assists he records feel likely.

🎯 Controlled finishing

Another area of Woltemade’s game which is interesting is his shooting. For a big guy, he has a preference for a controlled, accurate, side-footed shooting as opposed to relying on power, even when the opportunity may call for a little more oomph.

The results of his preference for dropping deep and controlled finishing can be seen in his shot map.

Woltemade grabbed 10 goals from 7.22 xG from open play, in just under 20 games worth of minutes. While the shots come from high-value central areas, there’s a real lack of tap-ins and long rangers.

While I’d hope that Howe will develop his game to help him run up his goal-scoring numbers with some finishes on the goal line and more powerful attempts from long range, when chances in the area do come his way, he’s accurate, calm and efficient 🔽

How he adapts to implement his playstyle against the EPL’s faster, better defenders will be the key here. If he does add a bit more power, more often to his shooting, then defences won’t know what to do with him.

🤕 Inconsistent aerial threat

The eagle-eyed among you may have noticed that there was just the one headed goal from Woltemade on his league shot map (just headed shots version below), and it’s another area that needs to be developed if he is to become a truly unplayable threat for defences.

While there were some promising signs of development here towards the end of last season and at the recent U21’s tournament, Woltemade has a 50% HOPS heading model rating.

This means he’s only given a 50/50 chance of winning a header vs. the average player. While this might seem counterintuitive, for a guy of his height who wins 3.02 aerial duels per 90, Woltemade is often pushed around by his markers and struggles to make good, controlled contact with his head.

Conclusions

As such, between his need to develop his heading, his power shooting and bringing consistency to his passing game, Woltemade is definitely a calculated gamble for Newcastle United.

In many ways, Woltemade’s game is already in a similar mould to Joao Pedro, one of our targets from earlier in the window, or Roberto Firmino. One that keeps attacks moving with unselfish efficiency and lifts the output of teammates around them.

The bet that Newcastle have made (as they did with Isak) is that Howe will develop the areas of his game that need work, and the player will hit his high ceiling if all goes well, although I don't think he'll ever get 25+ goals a season in the EPL.

The addition of Wissa to ease pressure on the inexperienced German makes this more likely, and give Woltemade’s potential ability to play from the left wing too, it should mean he gets the minutes and time to settle into English football.

In my opinion, he’ll need more time to adapt than Isak - whose pace terrified defenders from minute 1 - but Woltemade’s size, frame, and technical ability, sharpened by the rigours of the EPL and training with the likes of Burn every day, is a tantalising prospect for the future.

Because with even just modest improvements in his game, he becomes a true pick-your-poison attacker for defences that will have to concede space elsewhere to deal with everything that Wolte-Messi can bring to the table.

Newcastle United have completed their 4th signing of the summer, shelling out ~£40m for Jacob Ramsey from EPL rival Aston Villa.

Like Thiaw, the club have secured a player that’s been on their shortlist for a long time. Why does Howe like him so much? It’s time to take a closer look.

Pre-analysis overview

Before we look at any data, I'll add some context. Ramsey (nicknamed “JJ”) is 24 & a former England U21 international midfielder who came through Villa’s academy. Since 20/21, he has been asked to play a variety of roles for Villa as their squad evolved into Top-6 challengers.

All in all, it’s 10,000+ minutes of experience across all comps. It would’ve been even more had it not been for an injury-hit 23/24 campaign that seems to have given the player a reputation for being ‘injury-prone’ despite being available for the majority of 24/25.

As Villa adjusted for his absence, following his return from injury, Ramsey found minutes in the centre increasingly difficult to come by and played left wing, before eventually being replaced in that role midway through last season by an on-loan Marcus Rashford.

This creates an analytical challenge for me. It’s clear that Newcastle’s plan for Ramsey is chiefly to provide competition, cover, and eventually replace Joelinton in the left-sided central midfield role rather than operate on the wing.

So, because of this, I’ll need to draw on data from his 21/22 season, where he spent the majority of his playing time through the centre, to help analyse what he’ll be bringing to Howe’s team.

Additionally, because the left-sided central midfield role at Newcastle (see 🔵 dot) combines the traits of a box-to-box midfielder with those of a winger - receiving between the lines, creating from wide areas, crashing the box - his 24/25 data also provides us with valuable insights.

To illustrate that I’m not just a ‘Tactico’ with a screenshot of an out-of-context moment of a midfielder ended up on the wing to make a subjective point, here’s a heatmap of ball receipts of Ramsey (left) and Joelinton (right) to show the overlap in attacking areas.

Performances vs. Joelinton

With that context front of mind, let’s compare Ramsey’s 24/25 performances 🔴 vs. Joelinton’s 23/24 season 🔵, using a template that highlights the performance metrics Newcastle value in midfielders. Note Ramsey’s diminished defensive output from the wing.

Looking back at Ramsey’s 20/21 season 🔴, when most of his minutes came in central midfield, we see an increase in defensive output. Note that regardless of position, Ramsey offers stronger dribbling, ball progression, shot execution, and line-breaking passes than Joelinton 🔵

Player Analysis

It’s these strengths, Ramsey’s:

​​🏃‍♂️ Press resistant dribbling & ball progression
☄️ Better quality passing than Joelinton
↔️ Quality shooting off of either foot
⚖️ Potential defensive tradeoffs

That will form the basis for the rest of this analysis of what he will bring to Newcastle United.

🏃‍♂️ Press resistant dribbling & ball progression

I’ll start with an area where Ramsey is a big upgrade: dribbling. While Joelinton can move the ball, Ramsey’s carrying is elite, with only Leon Bailey at Aston Villa higher on Dribble & Carry On Ball-Value among 900+ minute players in 24/25.

If you’re wondering what the heck On-Ball Value (OBV) is, then here’s a quick explainer about how the model works. Think of it as data’s ‘eye test’ applied, less counting, more qualitative assessment of the players moving the needle.

While this level of ability to dribble and carry the ball has obvious attacking applications - more on that in a sec - it also makes Ramsey highly press-resistant.

Despite playing 900+ fewer EPL minutes than Joelinton, he dribbled past defenders in his own half 10 times, compared to 7 times for the Brazilian.

While I’m not knocking Joelinton’s ability to hold off a defender, Ramsey’s guile is more akin to Guimaraes’ ability to open up passing lanes that create counters.

Once free of the attentions of his marker and facing the goal, Ramsey's ability to move the ball into the final third (a Deep Progression) is chiefly powered by his ability to run with the ball, regardless of whether he plays at LCM (5.31 times per 90) or LW (4.05 times per 90).

☄️ Better quality passing than Joelinton

Being able to run with the ball is one thing, but having the composure to choose the right pass and execute it is an entirely different proposition. This is another area where Ramsey promises to be an upgrade to Joelinton.

This example shows Ramsey’s skill sets working in unison and typifies the kind of pass he likes to play around the penalty area. He’s a measured passer, likely to slip a pass down the side of a player rather than knock a hopeful ball into the box.

When we look more closely at the most frequently recurring types of high-value passes that Ramsey likes to play, we can see some clusters of similar activity:

• Cut-backs & balls across the box

• Balls into feet into the box & central areas

In central areas, Ramsey can break the lines with his passing and find his teammates in some of the most congested areas of the pitch, particularly impressed with the verticality of some of these passes near the ‘D’ and the half space on the left of the attack.

Some examples of all his tendencies in action are in the clips below. I’m particularly enamoured with the clip vs. Crystal Palace, the technical precision and tempo of that 1-2 before feeding the Digne isn’t something that Joelinton is great at for Newcastle.

When we compare Ramsey and Joelinton’s overall passing quality using Hudl Statsbomb’s expected pass (xPass) model, the gap in this technical quality between the two is highlighted.

Below is a plot of Joelinton’s passes vs. expected completion rates; nearly everything is below the average.

Now compare this to Ramsey, where his passes are mostly completed above the expected averages. I don’t like being hard on Joelinton about this - he is a converted striker after all - but the combination of Ramsey's improved dribbling & passing is going to help break down stubborn defences.

For those interested, here’s a little explainer of how the expected passing model works.

↔️ Quality shooting off of either foot

This brings us to the final section of this analysis, with an example of Ramsey’s passing, dribbling and shooting ending up in his only EPL goal last season (though he did score 4 in all comps).

Despite being a low-volume shooter, something that makes him less suited to playing wide, when afforded the right opportunity, Ramsey is a very classy finisher and strikes the ball cleanly using either foot and has 14 EPL goals since 20/21.

This is just two fewer than Joelinton in about 9 games worth of minutes less, I’d be surprised if Ramsey didn’t offer us a little more in this department as he spends more time playing through the centre.

Since 21/22, Ramsey has scored:

6️⃣ goals when playing Left Wing roles
8️⃣ goals when playing Central Midfield roles

This breaks down to 6️⃣ with his ⬅️ left foot and 8️⃣ with his ➡️ right foot.

Howe will doubt work with the young man to improve his shot volume, but his attacking fit in Newcastle’s system should help with that.

Here are all 17 of Ramsey’s goals for Villa. The moments when he’s crashing the box centrally from deep are particularly mouth-watering, and that left foot finish vs. Newcastle at Villa Park is seared into my memory.

⚖️ Potential defensive tradeoffs

Okay, so I’ve done a spot of pointing out things that Joelinton isn’t as good at as Ramsey at, so it’s time to flip the tables and highlight what we will lose whenever Joelinton isn’t in the team: his prodigious defensive work.

While the two men have been played in different systems, when played at LCM, Ramsey's ability to cover space off the ball is not at Joelinton’s level. To be quite frank, few pros are genuinely capable of that sort of pitch coverage.

However, the efficiency of Ramsey’s defensive work is pretty decent per 90:

Pressure regains:

• Ramsey - 3.39

• Joelinton - 3.42

Possession Adjusted Tackles:

• Ramsey - 1.78

• Joelinton - 2.04

Especially considering Emery doesn’t employ a high-pressing system.

Nevertheless, there isn’t a substitute for that level of running power, even if the emergence of Tonali as our 6, plus Hall replacing Burn at left back, gives #NUFC more legs to cover transitions. I suspect for a while, it’ll be dependent on how much defending #NUFC think they’ll need to do as to which man gets the nod, which should help protect both from fatigue injuries.

Conclusions

The Jacob Ramsey deal feels like a homerun for Newcastle United this summer. He offers a more attacking alternative to Joelinton (who has picked up more injuries in the past two seasons), with dribbling, passing and shooting better suited to breaking down defensive teams.

Ramsey gives Howe more versatility in a season where UCL games will stretch the squad and will help keep opposing managers guessing about which midfield three they need to prepare for.

What’s more, in a summer where the club can be accused of overreaching for targets, the Ramsey deal is perhaps evidence of the club rediscovering the sweet spot for their recruitment. The deal went from rumour to completion quickly.

This is because Ramsey perfectly fits the criteria of the club’s Recruitment Profile I shared earlier this summer:

✅ 24 years old
✅ Fast, hard working & high technical level
✅ 130+ EPL apps
✅ PSR-influenced opportunity

Making it an easier deal for PIF/Howe to sign off on.

In a bruising summer, it’s nice to see that lessons have not just been learned but are already being applied. With a couple of weeks to go in the window and so much still up in the air, it’ll be interesting to see if Newcastle United apply the same pragmatism to their striker search… 🤞

After 3 years of chasing the young German centreback, Newcastle United have finally signed Malick Thiaw (pronounced Mal-ick Tch-ow) for a reported fee of £35m including add-ons.

Why has Eddie Howe’s & the club's interest never really waned? Let’s break down what the 24-year-old will bring to SJP.

🚨 But first, a little advice about data and centre-backs.

Generally speaking, football data counts events that happen on and around the ball, which makes it an imperfect tool for analysing qualities like positioning, decision-making and anticipation.

So, while any decent analysis of any position involves putting the stats into context of what you see on a player's film, centre-backs especially need an increased share of traditional eye test scouting than most other positions on the pitch. Got that? Okay good.

Player Overview

So let’s dig into what the German international central defender (3️⃣ caps) will offer the first team squad.

Across his last 3️⃣ league seasons for Milan, Thiaw has split his time pretty evenly between RCB & LCB 🔽

The majority of these LCB minutes occurred last season, when Thiaw 🔴 returned to the Milan team after an ankle injury and bicep injuries disrupted his start to the season.

He’s how he performed vs. Schar 🔵 across those 21.9 games worth of 90 minutes.

When we dig back a bit further into the two seasons preceding this, where Thiaw 🔴 played chiefly as RCB, we get a more rounded view of his qualities vs. Schar’s 🔵 24/25 season.

✅ Stronger in the air
✅ Better on-the-deck defender
🤏 Slightly worse passing ability

I’ll try to highlight these differences in this analysis.

Before we delve deeper into these numbers, there’s another note I’d like to make. In his last 3️⃣ seasons, Thiaw has played 6,918 minutes in all comps for AC Milan/Schalke, while Schar has played a superhuman 12,489 minutes for NUFC.

That’s a real testament to Schar and the medical team at NUFC, only 11 players in the EPL (Bruno G being 1) have played more, but this disparity is a worry. “The best ability is availability”, and NUFC will hope for a little more luck here.

However, keep him fit, and Thiaw will bring a lot to the table:

🏃‍♂️ High top speed
✅ Good on script defender
❌ Medicore balance & post-mistake recovery
🆙 Great in the air
🏹 Strong passing, especially through the lines
🧑‍🤝‍🧑 A perfect partner for Botman?

Let’s go through these one by one.

🏃‍♂️ High top speed

Thiaw’s top speed is right up there for a CB, but his acceleration isn’t quite to the same standard. This foot race with Alexander Isak shows both themes, losing ground in the acceleration phase but able to keep pace with the Swede once up to top speed.

✅ Good on script defender

It’s this top-end pace that underpins his defending; he’s able to mop up stray balls and has good positional sense, especially when the game is structured or to script. He’s aggressive in the tackle and well-suited to the man-to-man pressing system that NUFC use.

❌ Balance & post-mistake recovery

However, there is a trade-off. Thiaw’s speed encourages him to try to win balls early, but if he misses, then his balance - especially through contact - sees him struggle to recover his bearings quickly.

It’s not awful - you can see him dealing with Lukaku in one of the clips - but he has a rash decision in him when he’s recovering from a mistake.

🆙 Strong in the air

One area where Thiaw is a clear upgrade on Schar is in the air. The lanky defender uses his height to get first contact on the ball well.

Using our HOPS model, Thiaw has a 72% chance of winning headers vs. the average professional, only behind Burn, Lascelles & Botman.

However, as the data suggests, he’s not truly dominant here and hasn’t scored a goal in 60+ appearances for AC Milan. It’d be interesting to see him in a set-up where he’s targeted with a running rather than a standing jump, but he’s more Matip than Virgil Van Dijk IMHO.

🏹 Strong ball progression, especially through the lines

As mentioned, Thiaw’s pace and aerial ability come without a significant trade-off in the passing stakes. While there is no doubt that Schar is a more aggressive passer, Thiaw is no slouch and completes a whopping 93% of all his passes.

This isn’t a case of the defender always choosing the easy pass, either. He’s used to playing under pressure, though his completion rate drops by 13%, which is the same as Schar's.

And he’s more than happy fizzing the ball through the lines into midfield and attack, in 24/25 Thiaw completed 6.02 Line Breaking Passes per-90, which is basically the same volume as Schar (5.86).

The key difference between the two is that Schar is also happy to dribble the ball up the field, whereas Thiaw is not. Probably, down to his balance issues. But again, when measuring the two’s deep progressions (moving the ball into the final third via a carry or pass), Thiaw (4.15) vs Schar (4.95).

🧑‍🤝‍🧑 A perfect partner for Botman?

Generally speaking, at NUFC, the team operates a Cover (LCB) & Stopper (RCB) roles at the heart of the defence. Where Burn or Botman act as the last line of defence, releasing Schar to attack the ball higher up the pitch.

By plotting a heatmap of their defensive actions, you can see this dynamic playing out across Botman and Schar for the past three seasons. Burn’s heatmap is very similar to Botman's, highlighting the systemic nature of the relationship between the CBs.

When we look at Thiaw’s defensive actions across his last three seasons when playing as an RCB, even in a different team, the heatmaps are strikingly similar. Thiaw will be coming into a role that will ask him to be active in the same areas of the pitch he’s used to.

Conclusion

It’s this that gives me confidence in his addition to the #NUFC. This stopper role should help Thiaw maximise his best qualities, while masking areas of his game that could otherwise be exposed on the last line of the defence.

After a couple of so-so seasons with Milan, it feels like another example of the club betting on Howe’s coaching and the strong systemic fit to bring more out of a player that, with a little polishing, could be a real gem for Newcastle United.

The following newsletter originally appeared on Bluesky as a thread of posts

Anthony Elanga has joined #NUFC in a £52m deal from Nottingham Forest. Following long-term interest, the acquisition ends the club’s 3️⃣ year search for a new first-team right winger. Why did Howe & co. opt for the 🇸🇪 international? Let’s dig in 🧵

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Let’s start simple & take a look at Elanga’s basic EPL numbers to help put the more advanced metrics into some context. At Forest, Elanga played the majority of his 2,750 minutes (30.6 worth of 90s) on the right wing, scoring 6️⃣ goals & recording 1️⃣1️⃣ assists.

Here’s how that translates into Elanga’s EPL output 🔴 vs. the league average 🔵 for 24/25 for attacking midfielders. Even at a glance you it’s clear that it doesn't give you the vibe of a forward capable of 17 goal contributions in 24/25 (& 14 in 23/24) or what you’d hope to see £50m+.

So that poses a couple of questions ❓

1️⃣ If his Elanga’s output looks ordinary, why are #NUFC prepared to pay so much for him?
2️⃣ If he’s average, how did he get close to 20 goal contributions last season?

So let’s dig for some answers.

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When it comes to the question of why Elanga? Well, he has qualities that Howe & Newcastle's scouts prize:

🏃‍♂️ Elite acceleration & pace
☄️ Dangerous (but inconsistent) crossing & set pieces
↔️ Versatile forward who can use both feet
👥 Team style negatively impacting stats

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🏃‍♂️ Elite acceleration & pace

Let’s start with one anyone could spot even after a few too many in the Strawberry. Elanga is fast both with & without the ball. How fast? Well, here he is cooking Lewis Hall over 15 yards. Hall isn’t a speedster, but Elanga makes him look Burn-esq 🔽

When presented with the right opportunity, his ability to generate enough separation across even short distances to get a cross in - or, in matchups where the speed disparity is high, to zoom past his man entirely - makes him dangerous in both counter-attacking & set-defence scenarios.

What's more, his ability to sustain his pace & speed across the 90 is truly elite. For sprints over 25km/h Elanga 🔴 delivers high levels of volume & distance exceeding Newcastle‘s current wingers 🟠 – bar the league-leading Gordon.

However, at times, Elanga’s speed comes at the expense of control. For Forest, he turned the ball over to the opposition 3.17 times per 90. While this should improve as a result of moving from Forest's improvised counters to Newcastle’s more repeatable attacking patterns, Howe has work to do here.

☄️ Dangerous (but inconsistent) crossing & set pieces

Because of his pace, opposing fullbacks drop a yard to buy reaction time, giving Elanga room to cross. When he gets them right, their shape & speed cause havoc. Here’s a peach vs West Ham that someone should be getting on the end of.

Last season, 6️⃣ of his 1️⃣1️⃣ assists were a cross from open play or a set piece. While crossing is a low probability way to score (taking somewhere between 65-94 crosses to generate a goal) in tight games, Newcastle often rely on them - especially from the byline - to break down stubborn defences.

In fact, when Newcastle are drawing, about 25% of their entries into the box come from crosses. So Elanga’s ability to separate & deliver could give even low blocks plenty to think about—especially if Howe can raise his successful crossing rate above 28%.

Here are four examples that typify his crossing. There are two successful and two failed crosses here, each of them has created genuine danger for defences. In particular, I’d like you to pay attention to the cross vs. Everton.

↔️ Versatile forward who can use both feet

That cross shows Elanga’s comfort using either foot. Turning him into a pick your poison proposition for full backs. Stand off too far, he'll whip a cross in, get too tight, he'll zoom by or shift onto his left to create a new passing/shooting angle.

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The use of his weaker left foot is deeply ingrained in Elanga's game. Last season, he attempted 159 passes with his left foot, completing 🔴 63.5% with the majority of failed passes 🟡 in areas of the pitch you’d expect them to be 🔽

Elanga’s comfort on his ‘wrong’ foot was something he added to his game during the 8-month Covid break. If you can forgive a bit of armchair psychology, to me this is evidence of his desire to improve & coachability - qualities that Howe loves above all.

The rewards of this hard work have been evident in the 24/25, with the young Swede scoring 5️⃣ of his 6️⃣ league goals with his left foot last season. 🔽

Rather than show you selected clips, here’s a handy video of every Assist & Goal from Elanga last season to give you and overview of how these qualities combine in key moments to elevate his output to exceed his underlying numbers.🔽

When analysing any of Elanga's film & data, his pace, crossing & comfort with both pop off the screen & spreadsheets. But questions about how well he’ll fit into Howe’s system & how much he could improve his output at Newcastle requires a little more digging.

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For example, some fans have asked: “Can he thrive in a high pressing team?”

Well, if we take a look back at his breakthrough season at Man Utd, there’s evidence of a player able to not just graft without the ⚽ (21.78 possession-adj pressures) but to do so effectively (3.58 pressure regains).

Now compare his off-ball work at Forest 🔵 to this same season at Man Utd 🔴. You can see the effect of Ralf Rangnick’s ill-fated attempts to play a pressing style vs. Nuno’s drop-in & defend approach.

It’s a very basic example of 👥 Team style negatively impacting Elanga’s stats. This is often referred to as “Team Effect” so it’s important to look at all of his output through the prism of the team he's been playing for.

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While Forest obviously made a run for the UCL places last year, Nuno’s sit-in & break on the counter tactical style left Forest with the fifth-worst attack in the EPL for the last two seasons based on the quality of the chances they created (xG)🔽

In that context, Elanga’s 6 goals / 11 Assist in 24/25 & 5 Goals / 9 Assists in 23/24 feel encouragingly consistent. Drop him into the EPL’s 4th-best attack across both seasons, & it’s fair to ask how much those numbers might climb. If Gordon’s rise is any guide, there’s reason to be excited.

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In rebuttable to this, I've seen some fans suggest that he’ll struggle in a team that plays a more possession orientated game, but that doesn’t stack up either. Despite #NUFC 🔵 having an average of 51% possession vs. Forest’s 42% 🔴 Howe’s team generated more counter attacking shots per 90.

Conclusions

In summary, Elanga’s profile is a natural fit for Newcastle United, but his game needs polishing. If Howe can repeat the improvements he's coached out of Gordon, Almiron & Murphy, the potential ceiling for Elanga feels very high IMHO.

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How high? Well, Howe’s done SUCH a good job of turning Murphy 🔵 into one of the best creative wingers in the entire EPL over the last 18 months, is there’s a decent chance Elanga 🔴 will have his work cut out to cement his place in the first 11.

So while the lack of clear statistical uplift vs. Murphy or the league average makes the fee feel steep, stylistically, Elanga looks tailor-made for Howe’s system. I wouldn’t bet against Eddie unlocking a new level in the young forward.

This was first published as a thread on BlueSky. This newsletter is for subscribers without a BlueSky account…

The 24/25 season was historic for #NUFC. Howe turned a rough summer into our first major domestic 🏆 in 70 years—and Champions League qualification.

But success brings expectation. With PSR easing & more games in 25/26, fans & Howe expect investment. But who to buy? Welcome to my third annual Summer Transfer 🧵

Subscribe now

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Before we get stuck into another host of names, let’s mark my homework from 24/25 🧵…

✅ Lloyd Kelly ✍️’ed for #NUFC
1️⃣1️⃣ Players transferred to other teams
⏳ Mbuemo & Trafford are heavily linked this summer

1️⃣ out of 2️⃣9️⃣… but gonna give myself a break because last summer was a farce tbh.

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To be fair, I don’t think even those at the club thought Howe/Mitchell saga would play out like it did, so i’m gonna give myself a pass.

However, seeing as we’re on the right side of the PSR minefield this silly season, I am gonna shake things up a little… #NUFC

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As before, I want this 🧵 to include as many realistic factors as possible, so I’m breaking things into 4️⃣ sections:

1️⃣ Potential Sales & Loans
2️⃣ Recruitment Strategy
3️⃣ Transfer Targets
4️⃣ PSR & Other Opportunistic Deals

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1️⃣ Potential Sales & Loans

Before we can assess new players we’d like to bring in, we need to take stock of the players we already have.

This is always difficult to predict, even more so following the surprise exit of Paul Mitchell & the ages of some influential members of the #NUFC squad.

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With that in mind, I’ve pulled together a colour-coded squad list that puts players into the following categories:

🔴 Likely Leave
🟠 Uncertain
⚪ Loan or Youth Team
🟢 Likely Stay

Let’s discuss the narratives in each group of #NUFC players

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🔴 Likely Leave

#NUFC have too many GKs & something has to give—suggesting Ruddy & Vlachodimos leave isn’t controversial.

With Kelly already confirmed as gone, it’s hard to see how Longstaff, Targett & Wilson stay given their playing time expectations & limited minutes in 24/25.

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🟠 Uncertain 1/3

The futures of this group are harder to predict. Personally, I think it’s time to sell Trippier—injuries are more frequent & he’s struggling to see out games.

With Livramento first choice, Krafth signing a new deal, and highly-rated Shahar coming through, we can handle losing him.

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🟠 Uncertain 2/3

There’s a chance that Ashby/Murphy could be kept around the squad to make up numbers or go out on loan again, but honestly, neither has played well enough away from #NUFC to earn a squad role.

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🟠 Uncertain 3/3

Which leaves Joe Willock. A player who, from all accounts, Howe loves, but who has lost a lot of confidence in his body since his Achilles injuries.

If the right bid comes in, then the club & player will probably part ways. #NUFC

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⚪ Loan or Youth Team

Nothing much to say here, I’d hope these lads will all stick around in one way or another. Some doubts about whether Kuol sticks around, but he’s shown enough at U21 level to warrant attempts to retain him IMHO #NUFC

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🟢 Likely Stay

My only real surprise here is Joe White’s inclusion in the full #NUFC first team squad.

He’s been the standout loanee this season (see link), and with Longstaff likely to go, White complements Lewis Miley as another ‘Trained at club’ player.

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2️⃣ Recruitment Strategy

So, assuming all of these players move as I think they will, this is where it leaves the #NUFC squad in terms of overall numbers.

Could quite easily see Trippier & not Ashby here at the end of the window. 🔽

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When you roll that up into actual deals, it's 6️⃣ new incomings to cover 7️⃣ positions

• 1st Choice Right Winger

• 1st Choice Right Centre Back

• Backup Centre Forward

• Young Goalkeeper

• Versatile U22 Central Midfielder

• Versatile U22 Wide/Centre Forward

Total Budget: £130-150m depending on sales #NUFC

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With the same manager who likes the same things in players, the recruitment profile is the same:

• Fast & Tall (~180cm)

• 26 or younger

• EPL or Major European Comp Experience

But this year, I’ve added PSR deals as an additional category in an attempt to buy players for less than they're worth #NUFC

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I know paying premiums for EPL experience is frustrating—it feels like it comes at the cost of high-upside deals like those Bournemouth or Brighton pull off.

But it does make outcomes more predictable. With Howe, not Mitchell, leading decisions, I’m expecting more conservative transfers. #NUFC

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3️⃣ Transfer Targets

Okay, now to the fun stuff. For each target position, I’ll use performance data alongside the profile above to help narrow my search and then make at least 3️⃣ recommendations 🥇,🥈 & 🥉 per position.

Players with sustained links with a move to #NUFC will be considered more seriously.

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Young Goalkeeper

I’m going to start at the back and work up the pitch. Which brings us to a new younger stopper to compete-with and eventually replace Nick Pope.

They’ll need to have Pope’s GKing fundamentals AND the ability to be an extra body in the build-up phase for #NUFC

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In data 📊 form, this includes the following search criteria:

• Positive Goals Saved Above Average (GSAA) & 🔼

• 65% Expected Save rate & 🔼

• 4% Clamable Collections Attempts over Average & 🔼

• Ability to sweep behind a high line

• High % of passes & completed under pressure

#NUFC

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🥉 Viktor Johansson | £8-10m

Probably the second best GK in the Championship last season, Johanson 🔴 is aggressive off his line & has impressive reflexes/shot stopping ability a get distance whenever he palms away. Punches balls he should catch though. #NUFC

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🥈 Christos Mandas | £15-20m

Linked with Man City, Mandas 🔴 is an effective-but-awkward- looking passer of a football, not Pope awkward but nowhere near Ederson. He’s aggressive off his line, catches shots but inexperienced & needs time to mature into a top-class EPL GK. #NUFC

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🥇 James Trafford | #30-40m

Heavily linked with #NUFC prior to an outstanding season in the Championship, Trafford 🔴 is a great sweeper, passes well off both feet & transforms our buildup.

Loves to catch cross where possible, but punches lack some authority, great shot stopper & penalty specialist.

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Re: Trafford, some people will want to point to his last season in the EPL with Burnley where he did struggle, but he won’t be the first or last GK to have had a rough time in a struggling team whose centre backs didn’t offer much by way of protection. #NUFC

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1st Choice Right Centre Back

For the past two summers, I’ve said that #NUFC need to add pace at centre back & it remains true. More pace at the heart of the defence allows our back four to play a few yards higher up the pitch, reducing the space between the lines & making us harder to play through.

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However, finding a player who has a ton of pace, is as good on the ball as Schar and is ideally better than the Swiss International in the air is not a simple task & data can only take so far with CBs. You need to watch more footage than other positions on the pitch #NUFC

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Boiled down to the relevant data points 📊 we’re looking for speedy centre backs that have:

• Better expected header (HOPS) % than Schar (59)

• Tack/Dribbled Past% = 70%+

• PAdj Tackles & Interceptions = 2+

• Line Breaking Passes = 4.5+

• Pass On Ball Value (OBV) = 0.03+

#NUFC
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In case you wanted to know a bit more about the HOPS model - effectively an expected header wins score - you can watch that here 🔽

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While I’m at it, here’s an explanation of our On-Ball Value model, too. This is especially powerful for evaluating the games of Midfielders & Wide Forwards #NUFC

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5️⃣ Malick Thiaw | £20-25m | 60% HOPS

Heavily-linked with #NUFC for a while, German international Thiaw’s 🔴 stock has dipped a little over the past season & a bit. He remains a player whose pace & 1v1 defending would complement Botman incredibly well.

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4️⃣ Taylor Harwood-Bellis | £20m | 65% HOPS

With a name that already sounds like an Eddie Howe signing, THB 🔴 was relegated with Southampton & is available at a decent price. Very tidy on the ball, plays an amazing long diagonal & strong in the air. He’d be higher up this list if he was faster across the ground. #NUFC

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🥉 António Silva | £25-35m | 66% HOPS

A integral part of Benfica’s team for three seasons, Silva’s 🔴 defensive positioning & calmness isn’t something that is easily measure by stats but is evident when you watch him play. He’s faster than Schar 🔵 without being insanely quick, matches his ability on the ball & is better in the air.

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🥈 Marc Guehi | £40m-ish | 61% HOPS

There is precisely zero chance that #NUFC do not try to sign Guehi 🔴 this summer. Because of that I’ve watch him a heap this season. His speed is top & his passing is unflashy but so, so good. His 1v1 defending could be better. #NUFC

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🥇Ilya Zabarnyi | £55-65m | 64% HOPS

Following the sale of his defensive partner to Real Madrid, I think it’s deeply unlikely that any club managed to pry Zabarnyi 🔴 ​​out of Bournemouth this summer, but if anything I’ve been more impressed with him than I was with Huijsen this season. #NUFC

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Versatile U22 Central Midfielder

While #NUFC do have Lewis Miley coming through, we’re perhaps lacking a technical midfielder who offers a chance creation/goalscoring threat from the bench to help us break down low blocks from 8.

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Because of this being something of a ‘tweener’ role in the squad, I’m looking for a few key data points 📊

• Possession Adjusted Pressures = 14+

• Line Breaking Passes OBV = 0.03

• Deep Completions = 0.60

• xG Assisted = 0.07+

Ideally, they’d be a left footer able to cover the right wing too. #NUFC

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4️⃣ James McAtee | £20m

With one year left on his deal, I’m hopeful that #NUFC take a swing on McAtee 🔴 at £20m-ish. His data is fragmented, but he’s left-footed, the right height, not rapid (but not slow), a good dribbler with an eye for goal. Howe will fancy his chances of improving his game.

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🥉Badredine Bouanani | £20–25m

I expect Bouanani 🔴 to be linked with a heap of EPL clubs soon. He’s got high cruising speed with the ball, always has his head up & can unlock a defence. Off-ball game needs work, but he’s just 20—Isak would LOVE these throughballs. #NUFC

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🥈Harvey Elliott | 30-40m

Despite his height, a move for Liverpool's Elliott 🔴 feels like a classic Howe deal. Like McAtee, he’s young, versatile & left-footed, but is a much more creative passer, which is what #NUFC need. Lacks top-end speed & needs to work on his shot selection, but works his nuts off.

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🥇Mateus Fernandes | £35–50m

I started looking at Fernandes 🔴 after nufcblog.co.uk said we were tracking the versatile Portuguese midfielder. A right-footer, he’s an excellent corner taker, great technician & very effective in the right half space. Lacks Joelinton’s raw physicality—but who doesn’t? #NUFC

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1st Choice Right Winger

A spot that #NUFC have overlooked for waaaaayyy too long – that cannot be shunted to the next window again.

The dream is an elite left-footed creator like Olise, but finding someone who blends size, pace, graft, & the subtlety to break down low blocks is rare.

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Ideally, we’re looking for a player with the following data 📊 markers:

• Expected goals (xG) = 0.12+

• xG Assisted (xGA) = 0.15+

• Pressure regains = 2+

• Dribble & Carry OBV = 0.05+

#NUFC

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5️⃣ Mohammed Kudus | £60m-ish

Another option who’s a bit too short & pricey to be ideal. Kudus 🔴 hasn’t shown his best at West Ham, with Bowen ahead of him in his preferred role. Even when used at RW, his creative output has been modest. The bet for #NUFC is that Howe could unlock more.

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4️⃣ Francisco Conceição | £25m

The Portuguese winger 🔴 hasn’t had a great time at Juve. Caught up in the turmoil at the Turin giants, it looks like the Serie A side won’t activate the €30m buy option.

He’s shorter than ideal, but has everything else #NUFC wants—at a bargain price.

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🥉Facundo Buonanotte | £40m

I’ve become a bit obsessed with Buonanotte at #NUFC. Stuck behind Minteh & Gruda at Brighton, he hasn’t had a real run—but under Howe, I think he could become a real goalscoring threat. He’s yet to show creative volume, but linked well with Vardy & our patterns of play suit him.

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🥈Bryan Mbuemo | 45-50m

Off the back of a 20-goal season & it being a position of need for #NUFC, this really is as simple as 2+2=4, especially given that Mbuemo 🔴 can cover at Striker too. There is a high comfort level that he hits the ground running at SJP, but…

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…At the prices being discussed, I have concerns. Even though he’s a good finisher, Mbuemo is unlikely to repeat a near 10xG overperformance & won’t be on penalties. It’d be a high-floor, low-ceiling deal, which isn’t a bad thing but maybe you could spend the money more effectively. #NUFC

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🥇Maghnes Akliouche | £50-55m

While I’ve heard he might not pass the ‘no dickheads’ rule, it’s hard to ignore Akliouche’s 🔴 talents & potential fit at #NUFC Signed by Mitchell at Monaco, he’s an elite dribbler & chance creator with good fitness & decent shot volume/selection…

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He has a VERY high cruising speed with the ball at his feet & a good sense of when to knock it into space. What I LOVE is how often he addresses the ball as he runs—it gives him more chances to shift it away from the defender & is reminiscent of Bernardo Silva’s dribbling style. #NUFC

Versatile U22 Wide/Centre Forward

This brings us to the section to last section of this 🧵, a back-up for Alexander Isak, #NUFC’s very own Harry Kane problem (how nice is it to be able to say that about our club btw?).

IMHO we’re looking for someone that offers something close to what Callum Wilson in the 23/24 season.

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Data-wise 📊 we just need someone who occasionally rotate in for Isak & save his legs in the last 20-25 minutes of games:

• Expected goals (xG) = 0.35+

• Shot OBV = 0.10

• xG Assisted (xGA) = 0.05+

• Pressure regains = 1+

#NUFC

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🥉Rafiu Adekunle Durosinmi | £15-20m

Following an ACL injury that scuppered a move to the Bundesliga, Durosinmi 🔴is wanted by both Wolves & Lazio. Available for a wallet friendly price, the Nigerian striker from Viktoria Plzen is a mini-Osimhen. He’d need time to adjust, but I like him a lot. #NUFC

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🥈Mohamed-Ali Cho | £20-25m

One to file into the more versatile end of this position of need, Mohamed-Ali Cho 🔴 is a left footed attacking midfielder, wideman & played up front early in his career for Angers.

If he had more experience, I might’ve proffered his name as 1st choice Right Winger for #NUFC

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🥇Yoane Wissa | £35-40m

At 28 he’s older than you’d ideally like for #NUFC’s recruitment profile, Wissa makes SO MUCH sense. A proven EPL goalscorer whose time left to test himself in the UCL is running out. I’m at least going to talk to his agent about his interest in being Isak's backup.

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4️⃣ PSR & Other Opportunistic Deals

Finally, this is my own personal transfer wildcards section. Deals that make sense from a PSR opportunity or that could be categorised in the Kuol, Minteh, Pivas, Salia & Cordero’s bracket. #NUFC

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Alejandro Garnacho | £30–40m

This might be controversial, but if he passes the character checks—remember Gordon was seen as a nuisance—I’d be all in on a PSR-driven Garnacho move.

3+ shots per 90 for three seasons, ~10 EPL goal contributions behind CR7 at the same age, & at a cut price… Sign me up. #NUFC

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Erik Kojzek | £15-20m

A real fun striker that has a small sample size alert 🚨. Playing in the Austrian Bundesliga & already described as a “mini-Haaland”, Kojzek is still figuring out how to best use his body, but if/when that happens he’ll be a nightmare. #NUFC

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Seriously though, what the actual feck is this Isak vs. Everton levels of nonsense… #NUFC

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Andrija Maksimović | £15m

Look at that radar. Just look at it!!! Whenever a 17 year-old gets into the 1st team you make a note. When they play like that… you make an offer.

✅ Left-footed
✅ Right winger
✅ Tall & Fast

Shut up & talk my money. #NUFC

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Franco Mastantuono | £38m

Then next wonderkid to come out of River Plate is also tall, fast, left footed & plays from the right handside. With a release clause at £38m, good chance someone decides to secure his services ahead of the queue, probs too rich for #NUFC at this stage of our growth.

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And there we have it. I could honestly go on for longer listing out wonderkids I think we should buy & if Sunderland hadn’t have been promoted Chris Rigg would probably be on this list too, but for now I hope you enjoyed this summer’s transfer 🧵

Now let’s see who #NUFC actually sign… HWTL

While writing last week’s newsletter about how Newcastle United’s young players out on loan had been performing, Garang Kuol was never too far from my mind.

The young Aussie International Winger has had a pretty rough time since transferring to Tyneside. Having joined in 2023, he was immediately sent on loan to Hearts to acclimatise to his new surroundings alongside some international compatriots. While he found game time hard to come by, especially after the manager who signed him received his marching papers, it seemed like a sensible way to settle him into the region.

The following season, he was sent on loan to FC Volendam, and after a few starts was promptly sidelined when they also asked the manager who bought him to the club and ended up playing just 8.1 games worth of 90s. Not ideal.

Then, as preseason for 24/25 got underway, the young winger scuppered any chance of a redemption loan by picking up a grade-three tear to his right quad that kept him from getting good minutes for the U21 team until January 2025.

This series of unfortunate events has tarnished the wider expectations of Newcastle United fans about whether he’ll ever be more than an Aussie-region marketing chip to the first team squad.

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Finally, a run of full games…

However, since returning to full fitness in a PL2 League 2-2 draw at home to Everton, things have started to turn around for Kuol. He’s started nine games in a row, playing 827 minutes, scoring four and assisting three goals and has physically matured enough to be ready for senior men’s football.

Incredible speed & dribbling

What is instantly noticeable is his speed, the kid is a burner and eats up yards against anyone that doesn’t have top-end meep, meep. It’s not just that he’s fast, it’s how direct he is. Kuol not only attempts just under 7 dribbles per match but also has the ability to move at pace with the ball through contact and, as the clips below show, has the personality to take responsibility to make the final pass or shot.

Decision-making needs work

While having the gumption to take on players and the responsibility to shoot or try to break down a defence isn’t something you want to train out of a player, you do want them to have a good understanding of where and when they take risks, and in this respect, Kuol plays immaturely.

Here’s an example of what I mean: Kuol takes responsibility when the play is a simple pass to a teammate in the box to his right.

Here’s another example of how his wanting to take responsibility sometimes works against him. Newcastle are on a break, and he just holds the ball for too long, forcing the attacker to his left to slow his run to avoid being offside and giving Arsenal the chance to recover. While he isn’t generally a bad passer, his poor decision-making stunts his ability as a volume creator in the final third for now.

While this is what you’d expect from a player at his stage of development, he’ll need a successful loan or decent minutes from the bench to improve this element of his game. And you know what, he’s a talented lad and sometimes that confidence pays real dividends.

A dangerous finisher

That is somewhat typical of Kuol’s shooting. Give this kid any shot at goal in and around the area he’s likely to take it. Below is his shot map in the run of games we’re analysing, 🟣’s are goals, 🔵’s are on target, and ❌’s are blocked shots. Lotta pot shots here and too few tap-ins here.

A couple of examples here of almost goals. Kuol is a pretty true striker of the ball when given space, can do it nicely on the run too and strikes the ball well with his left foot too.

Both of these misses are unlucky, and as you can imagine, when he does score, the goals are often spectacular.

Perfectly timed aggressive runs

One thing I am super-impressed by is Kuol’s ability to see space behind the defence and aggressively attack it with a perfectly timed run. When you watch the example below carefully, note how far he’s pulled off the full back who has. to build momentum to close down what he thinks will be a simple pass into feet, and how quickly Kuol turns that into a run in behind, once the midfielder takes a good touch. Unless you’re blessed with Kyle Walker's pace, this is incredibly difficult to defend.

We see a variation on the same theme in this clip vs. Leicester, where he pulls wide and creates the passing lane with a blindside run after seeing one defender deeper than the rest. Nice game of pick your poison for full backs, get tighter, and he might use his crazy acceleration against your momentum, stand off him, and he could blow past you anyway.

Happy in a high-pressure system

What any player needs to have a chance of getting in Eddie Howe’s first team squad is the desire to press and harry defenders when they don’t have the ball, and in that respect, Kuol looks like a natural fit.

Here we see the youngster rush the opposition to play the ball all the way back from our own third to Arsenal’s Goalkeeper. He even shows enough awareness to cover the passing lane to the full back and give two midfielders the chance to win the eventual pass from the goalkeeper.

His willingness to do the dirty work comes up again and again in the video of his play. This example in particular shows that Kuol doesn’t just have a desire to work to get the ball back, but an ability to read the game and apply his speed to winning the ball back. Eddie will be purring at this goal.

Conclusions

So what's next for Kuol? Well, he needs to get out on loan and get some serious minutes somewhere. A loan in the Championship would be ideal for both the player and the club, but a part of me thinks if he keeps improving at the rate he is, we might see him get some minutes during the next set of preseason fixtures. If he impresses Eddie and co. enough, then he’s got an outside shot at making up the numbers in the 25/26 first team squad.

Four games to go. In just four more matches, we’ll find out whether Newcastle United’s already historic season ends with even more to celebrate—more than even the most inebriated optimists in The Strawberry would’ve dared dream of, especially after a summer where the club’s leadership and manager looked completely out of sync.

Whatever happens from here—even if Howe’s men fall short of a Champions League spot—the season's success is already etched in history. The club has its first domestic trophy in 70 years (sealed by a second goal that came from an area of the pitch I flagged in my pre-final analysis). There’s even a shiny new entry on the club’s Wikipedia page to prove it.

While we wait to see where we land, you can be sure the club isn’t standing still. Inside the halls of St James’ Park, work is already underway to plan for every eventuality.

They’ll be laying the groundwork for new contract talks with key players, pulling together shortlists to help us handle whatever level of European competition we end up in, and figuring out which young players might break into the first-team squad next season.

And it’s that last bit—Newcastle’s next generation—that we’re diving into, taking a look at the performances of 12 players currently out on loan. Because if we’re going to have any success in Europe, we’ll need more than just 18 fit players and a dream.

Joe White - Midfielder at MK Dons

Let’s start with the player I think is most interesting on this list, Joe White. After making four encouraging cameos for Howe’s injury-hit team last season, White was sent out on loan to MK Dons for the 24/25 season.

So far, things have gone as well as one could hope. White has amassed 2,111 minutes across 33 league appearances for the League 2 strugglers, proving his value across a number of positions.

While it’d be hyperbole to suggest the left-footed midfielder has set the league alight, he has performed well enough in the context of a team currently languishing in 18th to be worth taking a longer look at him when preseason rolls around again.

A look at his performances 🔴 vs. the league average 🔵 shows qualities well suited to Howe’s style. Higher than average Dribble and Carry OBV indicates decent press resistance, he shows up well on possession adjusted pressures, tackles and interceptions, with an eye for a pass (Open Play xG Assisted) too.

While he only has a couple of assists to his name (both inverted crosses), and some work to do on the pace/care of his throughballs, he has a lovely composure to his game and the vision/craft to disguise his passes in behind.

He also contributed with 6 goals this season, while I doubt he could sustain this level of finishing, it’s encouraging to see White taking these chances.

Now I’m not suggesting that White steps in and becomes a first team regular, but with talk of Longstaff potentially leaving for Leeds – and Newcastle’s need for players to fill out a ‘trained at club’ home-grown player quota – White’s loan performances have probably earned him an extended look from Eddie Howe when preseason rolls around.

Harrison Ashby - Full Back at QPR

Another player for whom the Newcastle United coaches have had high hopes is right back Harrison Ashley. When he signed from West Ham, you could see the vision; the young defender had the whiff of Trippier about him, but needed minutes to kick on in his development.

After a so-so loan spell at Swansea last season, where he managed just shy of 10 games worth of 90s, this season’s spell at QPR has been moderately more successful, with the defender playing close to 20 games.

Though it’s worrying to see that for a second season, he’s struggled to nail down a starting spot in the midtable Championship side, Ashby has at least shown some versatility in playing most of his minutes from the left-hand side.

But as much as I admire the player’s ability to cross and pass the ball, any QPR fan will tell you he’s made a few mistakes that have cost the team points this season and he’s reaching the sort of age where he is running out of road to prove that he’s worth a shot Howe’s Premier League squad.

Alex Murphy - Full Back at Bolton Wanderers

Another player who made a few cameos in Newcastle United’s injury-hit 23/24 campaign was Alex Murphy. The young Irish Centre Back/Left Back impressed a few Toon fans with the steadiness of the small sample of minutes he managed last season.

Having joined Bolton Wanderers in League One this January, Murphy has been a regular and put in some Burn-at-full-back performances on the left of Steven Schumacher’s defence.

At just 20, Murphy feels likely to continue his development away from the North East and head out on loan again next season.

Max Thompson - Goalkeeper at Chesterfield

Another solid loan move sorted by Ameobi, whose bad luck with Kuol has maybe given him a bit of dodgy PR about his competence in his role at the club. Playing as no. 2 at Chesterfield, 20-year-old goalkeeper Thompson has started 18 matches this season, giving him invaluable experience of senior football at a pretty young age for a goalkeeper.

While he didn’t play among the best keepers in the league, he certainly hasn’t disgraced himself, and played well enough to secure his next loan move without much hassle. All in all, a solid loan spell that will help the young stopper develop all areas of his game.

Charlie McArthur - Centre Back at Carlisle United

Another 20-year-old who is benefiting from senior minutes following a loan deal agreed in January was Scottish centre back/full back Charlie McArthur. Splitting his minutes fairly evenly between the left side of a back three and left back, McArthur's quality on the ball has been clear but, like Murphy, he feels like another player who needs more time out on loan before he can seriously be considered for the first team squad.

Travis Hernes - Midfielder at Aalborg BK

Getting decent minutes in any top division across Europe is not to be sniffed at for any young player, so Hernes’ move to Aalborg BK is a big opportunity for the young Norwegian midfielder. So far, it’s proven to be a chastening experience for the youngster at the struggling Danish side. His performances haven’t been great, and he was one of three players who had to apologise for nightclubbing after a heavy defeat. Hopefully a solid learning experience for the young man.

Antonio Cordero - Wide Forward at Malaga

Not technically a loanee, however, for all intents and purposes, Cordero’s time at Malaga can be viewed through the same lens as the other entries in this newsletter.

Confirmed by Fabirizo Romano as joining the club this summer, the rumour mill suggests the young forward will head straight out on loan again to continue his development in 25/26. But what was it that made Mitchell and Newcastle’s recruitment team make the move for a young player also coveted by Real Madrid and Barcelona?

Well, first and foremost, whenever a player 18 or under starts getting regular first-team minutes, you can bet your last chip that their name will get flagged on the scouting systems of a raft of clubs from all over the world.

A Spanish U17 and U19 player, last season Cordero bagged 12 goals in 17 games for Malaga’s B team before being promoted to their first team squad in 24/25, where he has shown a decent amount of shot volume and ability to keep the ball in a team with the third-lowest xG in LaLiga 2.

From his spot as a right-footer playing on the left wing, Cordero has some work to do to improve his ability to create a yard of space to shoot or pass and decision making (to be expected for such a young player) in just over 20 games worth of 90s, Cordero has 11 goal contributions.

While his 6 assists so far this season owe more to the finishing of his teammates, it’s nice to see a couple of corners and chances created from the left of the box.

When it comes to his ability to find the back of the net, his numbers are somewhat boosted by a pair of penalties, with a heap of potshots from range. But considering Malaga are in the lower reaches of the table with an anaemic attack, I’m not gonna talk too much shit about a teenager taking the responsibility to get shots away. If he continues doing this in a more dominant attack, we can have a conversation, but for now, we just let ourselves bask in the dream of the player he might become rather than the player he is today. What I will say is that he looks a cut above among his age group at the international level.

Vakhtang Salia - Striker at Dinamo Tbilisi

No Hudl Statsbomb data on Salia, but I have some Wyscout stats to draw some insights from. Across 2,600 league minutes (about 29 games) for Tbilisi, the young forward has registered 7 goals and 3 assists. These are more than interesting numbers for a 17-year-old and certainly worth taking a punt on.

Over the last calendar year, he’s registering about 0.19xG per 90 from and over two shots (2.14) and nearly three touches (2.54) in the box per game. By watching videos of his play, you get a better idea of his qualities. He has a good first touch and intelligent movement, and kind of reminds me of how Ayoze Perez used to find himself in the right positions. His shot technique is good, his decision-making and passing show maturity for his age, but while I love that his short strides enable more opportunities to change direction, I don’t see truly top-end pace here.

You can watch him in the compilation video below. Whenever he plays in blue he’s normally number 7.

Miodrag Pivas - Central Defender at Willan II

I wanted to include him here because there’s hype around a new signing for Newcastle United, but he hasn’t had enough minutes to assess his performances this season.

Using Wyscout data for the second division in Serbia, his defensive metrics are hitting the edges of the radar for Passing (P%), Tackles per opportunity (PAT), Tackle % (T), Interceptions per opportunity (PAI), Aerial Duels per 90 (AD/90), Aerial Duels (AD%), Long passes per 90 (LP/90) and Long Passes % (LP%) only dipping for Fouls per 90 (F/90) which is encouraging.

Generally, I don’t recommend using just stats to chat about centre backs, so be wary of any analysis that relies too heavily on them for this position. So much of what makes a Centre Back great happens away from the action, so you need more video work and traditional scouting. What I will say is that Pivas is a glider who covers ground with an easy stride. He’s calm and confident, and his long-range passing is very encouraging. One to watch when he heads out on loan again.

Here we are again. This weekend, Eddie Howe’s Newcastle United will walk out at Wembley with another chance to end the club’s 70-year wait for a major domestic trophy. I’m not gonna lie—I’m bricking it.

Unlike two seasons ago, when our pre-cup-final form and finishing had dipped slightly on our way to qualifying for the Champions League, I felt like we had something of an even shot (at least before Pope’s sending off) at winning the cup against Ten Hag’s Manchester United. This time, I’m expecting us to lose.

I’m not trying to be defeatist, but the reality of facing off against perhaps the best club team in Europe – and by extension the world – while not being in scintillating form ourselves does not fill me with a tonne of hope.

I’m not meekly accepting defeat, just tempering my fannish hopes of seeing Newcastle United end the drought (or break the gypsie curse if you read Twitter a lot) with a cold dose of reality.

To win Newcastle are going to need a bit of variance (or luck if you prefer) and a solid gameplan to attack Liverpool’s weaknesses and limit their strengths, and it’s these that I want to cover in this newsletter.

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Just how good are Liverpool?

To be blunt, very-effing-good. With 29 matches played and just one defeat, Liverpool currently sits 15 points clear atop the Premier League table and it’s not a fluke. They’re generating 1.71 expected goals for (xG) and 0.77xG against (xGA) per 90 - nearly a goal (0.94xG Difference) a game worth of better quality chance created than conceded.

They’ve done this with a brutally efficient attack and defence, excelling in not just one, but both areas vs. the rest of the league.

As you can see from the images, Newcastle’s patchy performances place them firmly in a group of teams in the upper mid-table space. While at times they’ve shown glimpses of being the best of the rest, underlying squad depth and aging player issues have begun to bite in the final months of the season.

When it comes to their style of play, Slots Liverpool 🔴 are a finely balanced team that share some traits with Howe’s Newcastle teams 🔵, albeit with a boost in execution due to overall player quality available across their respective squads. In defence, both teams press the ball – though Liverpool less aggressively and with fewer bodies committed –  before dropping into a more passive positional game once a team has established possession in their half, allowing teams to keep the ball in areas that they deem less dangerous.

In attack, again statistically the outputs are largely similar with general player quality somewhat dictating the quality of the outputs. The superior in possession quality of Liverpool’s defenders allows for a more methodical approach to build up, while having two of the all-time Premier League greats combining down their right wing does not hurt the efficiency of Liverpool’s attacking.

How do you stop Salah & Alexander-Arnold?

A closer look at where Liverpool’s goals have come from this season confirms just how much gravity the right side of their attack has. The sheer volume of goals from that side of the pitch – especially from through balls – is eye-watering.

And while they do obviously create from the other side of the pitch and centrally to a degree, Salah and TAA’s ability to create shots for their teammates is also concentrated in the same areas of the pitch.

Knowing this is one thing, stopping it is an entirely different proposition. Given that no team has cracked the code for this so far this season. The only team to keep a clean sheet against Slot’s men in the league were Nottingham Forest. While perhaps the fact that they played Elliott Anderson – a central midfielder – at left wing might point to the success of a Willock/Joelinton combo, the lack of a centre back with Murillo’s recovery speed would suggest this approach would need some luck in its corner too.

Weak defensively down the right?

However, while Liverpool’s right side is an obvious attacking threat, it’s probably also the side of the pitch where you can succeed in hurting them. Without the ball, this is where their press is leakiest.

The side of the pitch where teams have success in running with the ball into Liverpool’s territory.

Where teams find it easiest to progress the ball into their defensive third, often into the spaces left by TAA going forward.

And the side of the pitch where the majority of the successful entries into their box also come from.

This leaves opposition teams playing something of a game of chicken, knowing they probably need to exploit the weaknesses on this side of the pitch, but also knowing that a mistake here is likely to lead with the ball at the feet of both of Liverpool’s best playermakers.

When we take a closer look at the few goals Liverpool have conceded from open play this season, we can see one major theme. Nine of the 21 open play goals they’ve conceded have come from throughballs, so manufacturing scenarios where they are available is probably a good idea.

When we look at where the passes from these goals have come from, there are two categories to try to exploit:

1️⃣ Throughballs from the half space on the left
2️⃣ Crosses to the penalty spot (ideally behind the defenders)

When we go to watch the footage of these goals, we can see some commonality in the build up of four of the examples.

All of them – in one form or another – see the following after a period of possession changing hands:

1. A pass that breaks the lines while Liverpool’s defence isn’t set

2. An attack that exploits the left-hand side half space (the vertical area of the pitch between the edge of the D and the front corner of the box)

3. A pace of attack that doesn’t let Liverpool reset their defensive shape

These may all feel like obvious things that teams will try to do every single attack if given the opportunity, but I would say that teams who prioritise verticality and pace in their attacking (Villa, Forest, Bournemouth, Fulham and yes, Newcastle) are more practiced at taking advantage of these moments.

Newcastle’s likely line-up

It’s pretty galling then the left hand side of Newcastle’s attack has been completely blown up in the past two weeks. Both Gordon’s pace and Hall’s natural left footed deliveries would have potentially caused Liverpool problems.

In the game at St James’ Park earlier in the season, from our usual 4-3-3 formation, Newcastle recorded the second largest xG Liverpool have conceded all season (1.34xG) – a game we didn’t come into good form with.

Even with the entire first choice left hand side missing, I find it hard to think Howe will move away from this shape to the one used at home vs. Arsenal when it’d be Krafth rather than Botman coming into the team at the expense of Joelinton/Barnes/Willock or Murphy.

So my gut feeling is that it’ll either be the team we saw vs. West Ham in with Barnes stepping in for Gordon and Livramento at left back or a combination of Willock/Joelinton dovetailing on the wing in front of the young England defender. I don't expect Howe to trial anything we’ve not at least seen before this season.

Conclusion

So there we go. I hope this newsletter has given you some things to hopefully look out for ahead of the cup final that were perhaps not the obvious “Newcastle will need to be at their best and defend well” that is normal with punditry ahead of a game where there is a clear favourite.

While I agree with the bookies in that it’s more likely that Liverpool will win, I do think their attack is potentially starting to feel the effects of a long season (see xG tendlines below) where they are still in the hunt for three trophies (at time of writing at least).

But having lost just once in the league and shown brutal efficiency in dealing with Howe’s men just a few weeks ago at Anfield coupled with Newcastle’s middling form of late, it’s hard to have a lot of confidence going into the game.

We’re justifiably underdogs without the weight of expectation (at least from me) and maybe, just maybe, Eddie Howe’s extensive experience of upsetting the odds and winning despite them will come good at the right moment for Newcastle fans this weekend.

It’s 5:30 am where I am. I have half a cup of coffee coursing through my system and am settling down to write a newsletter for the first time in a few months. Whereas I normally need the kick of caffeine to sharpen my senses right now the only fix I need is another ticket to Eddie Howe’s Newcastle United.

In my last newsletter – which you can read in full here – I broke down our start to the season in detail and broadly speaking highlighted the following:

1. Newcastle looked pedestrian in attack and had forwards searching for form

2. Howe was still trying to find a solution to the right side of the attack

3. Newcastle’s build-up play had evolved with fewer long goal kicks, with more play being going through Lewis Hall resulting in Newcastle United finally having a press-beating passer on the left side of the pitch

4. After a shaky start in the first five games, the defence showed signs of hitting a similar level to our UCL qualification season.

I also shared the following scatterplot in which Newcastle’s performance up until that point had been distinctly mid-table:

Leading to this little nugget:

While the defensive improvements seen across the last five games offer some optimism, sustaining these gains is crucial. Ideally, we’ll also boost our attack to move our fundamentals into the top-right quadrant, where results are a little more predictably positive.

Well, assuming that 99% of the people reading this are Newcastle United fans and already know how this phase pans out, let’s take a step-by-step look at the changes that have not only led to some predictably positive results and also pushed Newcastle United to a nine-game winning run.

Just put it in the net!

Let’s pick up the baton right after the 1-0 home win against Arsenal and Newcastle’s fantastic 3-1 win away at Forest.

Still trying to find a solution on the right side of the pitch, Howe moved Gordon to the right wing and re-introduced Joelinton and Willock taking turns to play left midfield and left wing as they did in 22/23.

Trailing 1-0 at the half, Howe shifted Gordon back to the left and moved Joelinton across to the right, to nearly instant results. After levelling from a smart Isak finish from a knockdown from Longstaff at a corner, Tonali came on for Willock and his running power helped set up two breakaway goals.

At the time, I felt like it was a turning point for the season. In the last 18 months, Newcastle have struggled to win away against in-form teams AFTER going behind. As the xG race chart below shows the win was entirely deserved and the international break came at the wrong time to sustain this momentum.

A winnable-looking home game vs. West Ham welcomed the players back from international duty. Thinking he had found the solution to unlock his attack, Howe set up with nearly the same side that ended the game Forest in the home game vs. West Ham. The only change was Lloyd Kelly making his first league start in place of Dan Burn.

After Isak’s classy finish from Hall’s through-ball was ruled out for offside in the opening minutes Newcastle conceded, this time due to Kelly losing Soucek from a corner. Despite generating 18 shots and two very high-value first-half chances for Gordon and Isak (though it was close to being offside), the yips in front of goal had resurfaced.

Though I maintain that West Ham would’ve probably crumbled had either player drawn us level, instead, we were suckered on the counter with Wan-Bissaka adding a second just after the break. Despite making attacking changes to get back into the game, Newcastle looked tepid and lost control in the middle of the park. At this point of the season, Howe’s search for the right combinations off the bench only made the attack meeker. It was back to the drawing board.

Howe implements his vision for Sandro Tonali & Bruno Guimaraes in the same midfield.

The next game away at Crystal Palace was the lowest ebb of the season for the team’s attacking play this season. In a tepid display, they recorded just one shot on goal and somehow managed to grab an underserved lead via an own goal. After riding their luck Newcastle’s resolve finally broke in the 94th minute as Munoz grabbed an equaliser with a header at the back post.

This game was more notable than a lucky point earned. It was the first time this season that Sandro Tonali lined up as the central player (or number six) with Guimaraes moving to the right of Newcastle's midfield three.

Following a year away from first-team football, Tonali had generally played in one of the more attacking midfield roles (referred to as a number eight) on either side of Guimaraes, with Howe gradually increasing his involvement – much to the annoyance of many Newcastle fans who were frustrated that Longstaff remained in the starting eleven.

At Palace, that dynamic changed and – despite a woeful attacking display – Howe committed to switching the men’s roles. The thinking behind the switch is clear as it simultaneously resolves two longstanding issues in the make-up of the Newcastle United midfield:

1. A poor ability to manage defensive transitions or counterattacks due to a lack of recovery pace at the six position

2. A lack of a technically gifted creative passer at either of the eight positions has made breaking down defences harder

He stuck with its benefits against Liverpool before finding out to his detriment how much value this adds vs. Brentford where he rested Toanli for Longstaff and switched Guimaraes back to six. Though even in that game Newcastle were on the wrong end of chasing a game they should’ve been winning.

1. Tonali vs. Guimaraes without the ball

The first of these points is fairly simple to visualise. Below you can see side-by-side heap map comparison of where Tonali and Guimaraes’ defensive actions (pressures, tackles, etc) take place when playing as a six.

Tonali’s greater ability to cover ground is clear. Whereas Guimaraes was limited to a fairly central column of activity within Newcastle’s defensive half. In retrospect, the swap is so obvious that it was probably Howe’s plan all along, but it does come with a tradeoff.

2. Tonali vs. Guimaraes with the ball

When it comes to Tonali’s use of the ball, you may have seen some analysts on social media suggest that Tonali would be ill-suited to six role. Generally, this is because, in his career at Milan, Tonali’s 🔴 data markers did not show an ability to pass as accurately under pressure nor offer a large volume of progressive passes into the final third of the pitch when compared to the league average 🔵, which were key qualities Guimaraes bought to the role.

While these concerns are legitimate if you were to drop Tonali’s combination style – which often involves multiple first-time passes back to the centre-back, full-back or midfield partner – into the same Newcastle United team that Guimaraes helped to transform, the supporting cast around the position has changed.

Although Guimaraes had help on the right-hand side of the pitch in the ball-playing abilities of Trippier and Schar, whenever he had the ball on the left teams would aggressively press in an attempt to force the ball to Burn or Pope in the hope of a turnover.

The emergence of Hall as a press-resistant and progressive passer down the left helps to nerf that ploy, while Guimaraes himself is also available to drop in beside and swap roles with Tonali to move the ball around opposition players.

In the recent cup win away at Arsenal without Guimaraes (a milestone of its own kind) Tonali’s passing success in the role dropped from 87% to 75%. While it is obviously a tough away fixture and a drop is somewhat expected, it indicates that Tonali’s collaborative style works most efficiently when the right players are around him. It’d be interesting to see how he copes against Bournemouth this coming weekend, as relentless pressers of the man in possession, the fixture is a great litmus test.

Here are some heat maps that show the stylistic difference in more detail. On the left of the image, you can see where Tonali receives the ball when playing as a number six. On the right, you can see the end locations of his passes.

Note how there is a heavy concentration of receipts at the bottom edge of the centre circle but more passes are played to his right (to Guimaraes/Schar) or left (Hall) rather than penetrating through the middle of the pitch.

Now compare these with how Guimaraes approaches the role. While his ball receipts are more concentrated, his passes are also more penetrative in valuable central areas of the pitch.

The switch to this new role 🔴 has allowed Guimaraes to apply this same ability in more impactful areas of the pitch for Newcastle and has increased the value added by his line-breaking passes (LBP OBV) and a dramatic increase in the volume of chances he’s creating for his teammates (Open Play xG Assisted).

And in just under 10 games since the swap, Guimaraes has created 22 shots, including 10 chances for Isak.

Murphy & Gordon get their groove back

While the Tonali and Guimaraes switch has fundamentally changed the play in both directions, the reintroduction of Jacob Murphy has also been pivotal to the recent upswing in Newcastle United’s form.

While early in the season Murphy’s inability to replace his performances from 23/24 forced Howe to compromise the performance of players like Gordon, Joelinton and Barnes to find a solution that would fix his spluttering attack, it seems the spell out of the team did him some good.

Below you can see Murphy how much he has improved 🔴 since his reintroduction vs. the opening weeks of the season 🔵

Since returning to the team, he’s more than doubled his expected goals (xG) from 0.06xG from just over one shot per 90 to 0.29xG from two and a half shots per 90. With similar levels of improvement in the quality of chances he’s created for teammates raising his open play xG assisted from 0.20 to 0.46 per 90 helping him climb to three goals and six assists in just 13.3 minutes worth of games. Not bad for a “squad player”.

Combined this improvement in his form has brought him largely back in line 🔴 with what we saw from Murph last season 🔵

Gordon & Isak hit top form

The beneficiaries of Murphy’s and Guimaraes’ creativity have been Anthony Gordon and Alexander Isak.

After joining the group late after the Euros, then being moved around to plug gaps in the team while Isak was injured and being used as a temp solution on the right wing, Gordon hadn’t hit his stride.

In my last newsletter, I mentioned he had to juice his shot volume from his early season form 🔵 and with a return to his favoured spot on the left and a better supply of quality chances he’s now taking three plus shots per 90 🔴

And looks on track to repeat his double-double (10 goals, 10 assists) from the 23/24 season. Getting him tied down to that new contract didn’t hurt matters either but right now every other team vying for the top six positions in the table would take him in a heartbeat.

Which finally brings me to Alexander the Great. There’s honestly not a heap more to say about Isak that hasn’t already been written by others, but I’m going to give it a shot.

I didn’t necessarily think it was possible, but despite Newcastle’s iffy attacking form until November Isak is on track to better his breakout 23/24 season in style.

In doing so he’s scored his 50th goal for Newcastle and became only the fourth player in Premier League history to score in eight consecutive games.

Having scored 15 goals so far this season he’s finishing well ahead of his total of 10.68 xG. However, this for his third season in a row he’s outpacing his expected numbers putting him into the bucket of above-average finishers who are irreplaceable.

What’s particularly impressive is how often Howe’s men can get him into open space via through balls, he’s so good that when he does miss one of the triangle-shaped shots we think it’s a bad miss rather than him just being human.

Isak is also just flat-out creating more chances for teammates this season, improving his xG Assisted to 0.15 per 90 from open play rewarding him with five assists at just beyond the halfway point of the season. Previously at Newcastle and Sociedad, this number has flitted between 2-3 assists for an entire season, be interesting to see if this is just a purple patch or if the decision-making/execution of his final pass remains as good.

Overall team performance

So let’s do a comparison of Newcastle’s performance data radars for the first 11 league games 🔵 vs. the next ten 🔴 to see how much they’ve improved.

Attack

Defence

It’s the sort of upturn in performance and form that leaves you feeling like…

Even if some of the markers of defensive play looked good, the attack was so anaemic that anyone that lost a little faith that Howe could turn things around can be forgiven. It should also serve as a reminder of just how good he is at finding solutions to problems and turning things around.

Some commentators will point to our recent strength of schedule. While there is an element of playing teams at the right time (Spurs/Man Utd), benefiting from red cards (Villa), or facing weaker sides (Ipswich/Leicester), we also have yardstick performances against Liverpool at home and Arsenal away in the cup.

Anyway, to finish remember the scatterplot at the start of this article? I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t, it’s taken me quite long enough to write let alone for you to have read (my current time is 12:28 pm a whole day later) but here’s how Newcastle are shaping up vs. the rest of the league since the 2-0 home defeat to West Ham.

Fingers crossed that all the bad luck we had with injuries last season evens itself out—because a spell without Isak would be tricky to manage. But with five Champions League spots likely up for grabs via the league and a clear route to another final at Wembley mapped out, this season has the potential to be very special indeed.

HWTL

Hello again. It's been a couple of months since I last dusted off my keyboard to write about the never-ending story of Newcastle United. It's been even longer since I properly delved into the underlying numbers that depict the health of Eddie Howe’s team.

In my last post on this subject, I concluded that, with the additions of a new centre-back and right winger, and with a fair wind, Newcastle United could be in the mix for the Champions League spots. Unless things dramatically change—and there are some signs that they might—I’m far less confident about this prediction.

Why? Well, now that we have 10 league games worth of data from the new 2024/25 Premier League season we simply don’t look good enough to sustain a run for the top 5. To borrow a phrase from the hype beasts on Twitter, our metrics “look mid”.

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Pedestrian in attack.

Before we start interpreting the data, it’s important to remember that we had a red card in the opening game of the season, which somewhat negatively skews our small sample.

Nevertheless, Newcastle United’s attacking 🔴 so far this season is a little below the league average 🔵. We’re taking too few shots (12.4 per 90) at a pedestrian-level chance quality (0.10 xG per shot).

When you compare this to 2023/24 🔴, the difference is stark. Across nearly all metrics on the radar, performance is down, and if we’re to have any chance of securing a European spot, we need to improve quickly or get lucky (more on our luck so far later).

The key to turning this around is the intensity and effectiveness of Newcastle United’s press. In a team that – Guimaraes aside – lacks technically gifted passers who create chances, winning the ball back in the opposition half when they’re about to transition into an attacking phase of play is so, so important.

While I’m sure there are some reading this rolling their eyes and saying “well duhhhh Kev”, for any reader that doesn’t understand how powerful winning the ball back high up the pitch is important for the health of our attack, I’m going to lean on a famous Jürgen Klopp quote:

"Think about the passes you have to make to get a player in a number 10 role into a position where he can play the genius pass," he later urged. "Gegenpressing lets you win back the ball nearer to the goal. It's only one pass away from a really good opportunity. No playmaker in the world can be as good as a good gegenpressing situation, and that's why it's so important."

When the intensity disappears from our pressing, chances dry up for our attackers. For the first five games of the season, rather than looking like a team of 'swarmers'—as the ever-excellent George Caulkin likes to describe them when they’re playing at full tilt—they looked like they were running off too many chicken shawarmas.

*groans from the back*

Crap dad jokes aside, I can only speculate about the reasons behind this. Perhaps it’s James Bunce’s influence on training loads designed to keep players fit more consistently. Perhaps it’s some ring rust affecting engine-room players like Joelinton, Tonali, and Willock, who missed a lot of football in 2023/24. Or perhaps it’s the overall tiredness of players like Guimaraes and Gordon, who didn’t get a break from football this summer. But when 'intensity is our identity' is your team mantra and an essential part of your game model, any drop-off in energy levels is felt as keenly in attack as it is in defence.

If that all sounds…a bit crap, then let me add some pep to your step. Across the full ten games, our off-the-ball play is beginning to reach our usual shithouse levels.

And in turn, across the last 3 league games against strong opponents (Brighton, Chelsea & Arsenal) we’re seeing very modest increases in performance on this side of the ball. It’s encouraging, but we will need more against teams who look to frustrate Howe’s men rather than meet them on equal terms.

Forwards still searching for form.

It’s cliche, but utterly true that “Goals change games” and too many times— especially across the games vs. Everton and Brighton—Newcastle United have failed to make the most of being on top in games and is four goals behind (including penalties) where we’d hope they’d be after ten games.

While it’s too simplistic to say that Isak missing a one-on-one vs. Brighton and Gordon missing a penalty at Everon when both games were 0-0 would’ve led to an extra five points on the board, it’s also not hard to imagine the difference getting a goal ahead in both games would’ve made.

While I’m thankful that following two games vs. Chelsea and a truly excellent headed-winner vs. Arsenal, Isak seems to have found his shootin’ boots, we could do with performances 🔴 this season being a little closer to his 23/24 🔵 levels.

So far only Harvey Barnes is getting anywhere close to his shot, expected goals (xG) and expected goals assisted (xGA) output compared to last season 🔴

And it’s especially bad down the right side of the attack where Murphy's and Gordon’s shot output has nearly enough halved so far this season 🔵 when compared to 23/24 🔴.

While Murphy is a total boom-and-bust player whose contributions are better from the bench, Howe will be looking for more from Gordon as the season unfolds. I’m generally not too down on his overall performances given that he’s had to fill in for Isak in a couple of games and is coming off a summer where he joined the group late, but he needs to juice his shot volume.

So where are the solutions coming from? Well, the re-emergence of Joelinton and Willock’s near-telepathic partnership down the left-hand side of the attack was a real feature in the win vs. Arsenal. Their athleticism during transitions is incredibly valuable in both directions of play, while Willock offers more reliable press resistance, consistent passing and carrying ability from midfield than the big Brazilian.

As noted by a couple of Twitter pals this week, against Arsenal, Willock also pushed closer to Isak than we have seen since maybe the 22/23 season. Whether this was a match-specific instruction or a more systemic tweak that we’ll see regularly is something to keep an eye on. It relies on Longstaff dropping into a more holding role next to Guimaraes to create a 4-2-4 shape with the ball. That extra man at the top of the pitch supporting Isak is not the worst way to help kickstart a misfiring attack.

It certainly worked for the goal vs. Arsenal…

The consequence of sticking with the ‘Two Joes’ on the left wing approach, opens up a question of what Anthony Gordon offers if he’s moved to the right wing. Well, across his time at Everton and Newcastle United, he’s shown an aptitude for playing on that side of the pitch—including scoring vs. Bournemouth from that side this season. Below you can see his overall performances playing left wing vs. right wing across his entire Premier League career.

While his shot volume does take a modest dip, so long as he’s pumping his numbers back to his historic norms, it might be a sacrifice worth making while we wait to add a right-sided attacker in January. Personally, I think his creative passing numbers are likely to improve the more time he spends playing on the right of an Eddie Howe attack but that is more of a vibes take on my part. Truthfully, before Barnes’ injury last season allowed him to excel at left wing, I think Gordon as a right-wing option might have been the squad-building plan all along.

An evolving approach to building out from the back.

Another benefit of getting the ‘Two Joes’ back together on the left is that it gives Newcastle United the option of utilising Joelinton’s height and duel-winning ability against fullbacks from goal kicks.

This more direct approach was a feature of our goal kicks in the 22/23 season, with the land spot often well beyond the halfway line. Though it’s not particularly pretty to watch, this more risk-averse and territory-based approach to nerf any opposition attempts to press from restarts has its virtues.

Last season, we moved away from this approach, playing a greater number of short balls as Howe began evolving the team's approach with the ball, encouraging them to play out from the back and through the thirds of the pitch more often.

Newcastle felt the pain of this evolution keenly in defence. As average Goalkeeper Kick Length decreased from 40m to 34m we saw High Press Shots Conceded increase from 2.42 to 4.39 per 90 and the goals against tally increased from 33 to 62. There is, of course, more than one reason for such a substantial jump, but I firmly believe we suffered from a bundle from this.

So far this season, we’re seeing something of a mixed bag in terms of the team’s approach to goal kicks. Fundamentally, it’s still a bit too early to interpret real signals as opposed to noise in the sample of data we have so far.

One thing that is clear to see is that the emergence of Lewis Hall as a first-choice left-back has changed the balance of short passes from goal kicks.

The gravity of Hall’s passing ability—who played as a midfielder for most of his youth career—has resulted in him playing a bigger role in Newcastle’s build-up play, receiving the ball more regularly and centrally than Livramento on the right.

Filling the void left by Trippier’s fitness woes and an overall dip in his form since Everton away in 2023/24, Hall has emerged as a reliable outlet valve when Newcastle are attempting to play through the press and offers a significant number of Deep Progressions – passes or carries that move the ball into the final third.

While Hall 🔵 playing his full-back role in anywhere near as aggressive manner as Trippier 🔴 did in 22/23, his game is more suited to a large role in Newcastle’s build-up than Livramento 🔵 – who relies more on dribbles to beat the press and generate value for Newcastle United.

Having a legitimate press-beating passer on the opposite side of the pitch to Schar in theory gives more freedom to Guimaraes to roam and makes it a little harder for opposing teams to funnel Newcastle’s possession to a perceived weaker side. Watching the team’s build-up play continue to evolve as Hall gets more comfortable and the chance to play alongside Botman is something to look forward to in 2025.

Signs of our defence returning to their best?

I’m not gonna lie, after the first five games of the season 🔵—when ironically results looked good—I was pretty worried about the state of Newcastle United's defence.

While that part of our sample includes the red card home game vs. Southampton, we were conceding 18 shots per game and approaching two expected goals against per 90.

Though I expected us to improve as the season wore on, I didn’t imagine it would happen quite so quickly, and certainly not so much against the strong opposition we’ve played in our most recent set of 5 games 🔴. These are levels we’ve not seen since 22/23, can we keep it up? Remains to be seen.

While luck in front of goal deserted us against Brighton and Everton during that run of results in our first five games, we can thank our lucky stars for Nick Pope. He's returned this season in fine form and, through ten games, he's already at 4.76 Goals Saved Above Average (GSAA).

It highlights how much of a miss he was when he was injured last season. While his passing may leave plenty to be desired, his sweeping and actual goalkeeping is among the best in the division and any potential European run will rely on his form.

Conclusions

So, with 10 games and 15 points on the board, things look like a mixed bag for this version of Howe’s Newcastle United—a sentiment reflected in the team’s overall xG for and against trendlines, as well as our current mid-table position and middle ranking in xG created and conceded this season.

While the defensive improvements seen across the last five games offer some optimism, sustaining these gains is crucial. Ideally, we’ll also boost our attack to move our fundamentals into the top-right quadrant, where results are a little more predictably positive.

Before I leave you, here’s one final reason for optimism: the strength of the schedule we’ve played so far—especially at home. So far, seven of our ten games have been against teams currently in the top half of the league. When you’re not at your best, tougher games become a coin flip, reliant on a few key chances being taken or saved at just the right times. Without improved attacking metrics, however, even strong defending won’t protect us from the occasional long-range stunner that finds the top corner.

When you’re not at your best, tougher games become a coin flip where you rely on a small handful of chances being taken or saved at the right times. Unless our attacking metrics improve no amount of great defending will protect us from the games where a 30-yarder finds its way into the top corner.

After encouraging performances against Everton, Brighton, Chelsea (twice), and Arsenal, I genuinely hope our results will continue to improve. Right now, though, we’re in a bit of a hinterland, waiting to see how the remainder of 2024 will unfold. Fingers crossed we’re both good enough and lucky enough to stay within reach of the European spots when the January window opens and gives us a chance to refresh the squad.

Hello folks 👋, sorry for the radio silence recently. Life has given me the exciting opportunity to experience a new timezone for a while, so you might find me a little less active/responsive on Twitter. Expect more of my spicy takes to appear here and directly in your inbox.

As with any big life move, it involves a sh*t tonne of admin, stress, and anxiety. So I’ve had little to no bandwidth left to write about the unsatisfactory conclusion to Newcastle United's summer transfer window. I have thoughts...

In a previous iteration of the person you know as ‘Kev the stats wanker from #NUFC Twitter’ I used to work as a consultant in organisational change management. Basically, if circumstances at your work forced you to change the tools, equipment, processes, reporting lines, etc, etc, it was my job to ensure that you could continue to do your work efficiently the moment they switched off all of your familiar systems or ways of working.

What does any of that have to do with Newcastle United’s summer? Well, a heap of the theory which supports that sort of work is independent of the industry you apply it to. While there are plenty of models to choose from, the Kübler-Ross change curve (see image below) underpinned my old work. It’s pretty simple, there are five stages (shock and denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance) people who are affected by change need to move through. It takes planning, time, effort and resources to do without friction.

No matter what they do for a living people universally hate change unless it is managed well. Let me tell you, change at Newcastle United this summer has been managed very poorly by the Public Investment Fund (PIF), Darren Eales and Paul Mitchell.

It starts with changes at the top…

Why haven’t I included Howe in that initial list? Well, while he’s not blameless (more on this later), change was imposed on Howe by PIF and Eales. He went into the summer with certain expectations about who he’d be working with, operated within the existing structures on plans for the summer, had already agreed on the shortlisted transfer targets, knew the budget, and understood the process for buying and selling players.

Then one morning, he came into work and (reportedly) was told with an hour’s notice that everything would be changing. The bosses he trusted would no longer be his bosses, and he would be reporting to someone new. Everything he and his colleagues at the club had worked on for the past few months was now up in the air. Oh and this new guy called Bunce was going to review his training methods to ensure there were fewer injuries. It’s not a cocktail that makes one feel at ease. While I don’t necessarily think Howe should have expressed his concerns so publicly, with England sniffing around for his signature, he played his hand.

The truth is that PIF/Eales could have done more to avoid such a situation at a pressured time. After failing to manage PSR/FFP appropriately, the decision to move on from Staveley and Ghodoussi—who are not experienced football executives—was the right one in the long term. However, making such a disruptive change in the middle of a transfer window feels impulsive from PIF.

For those of us who follow updates on Companies House, it’s long been clear that Staveley and Ghodoussi’s time in charge of the club would be limited. Each time PIF and the Reuben brothers invested new capital into the club, their shareholding would reduce, creating a natural endpoint to their time as owners. But given that the size of the PSR black hole was known before January (hence all the links with players potentially leaving), why did PIF wait until midway through the transfer window to make the change?

One could argue they expected Bruno Guimaraes to be sold to cover the PSR shortfall, but should a player sale define the leadership of Newcastle United Football Club? Personally, I don’t think so. Rather than letting the ship get so close to the iceberg, why not make the change once the January window had closed? Why let Staveley chase the appointment of Freedman if she wasn’t going to remain in charge? It doesn’t feel like joined-up thinking from PIF or Eales; it feels more egotistical, and that worries me.

Mitchell joins with a big reputation but makes some poor initial choices…

But so what? Newcastle United have appointed one of the biggest, most respected Sporting Directors in global football, and that can only be good, right? RIGHT? In the fullness of time, I expect Mitchell to have a transformational effect on Newcastle United. He’s an expert at identifying talented players around the world before others and trading those players to benefit his employer. It’s the ONLY way Newcastle will be able to quickly bridge the gap to the top six, and it’s essential for the next five years of the project.

Upon stepping into the role, he had some choices to make in his first few weeks. Does he build bridges and relationships with his new colleagues and stakeholders by respecting the work that’s already gone into preparing for the window, while trying to add value where he can? Or does he take a more disruptive approach and stamp his ideas all over this window? In the end, I think he did a bit of both.

While I sympathize with the idea of wanting to make your mark in your first window at a club, speaking so publicly to the press about your new role and plans before you’re fully aligned with a manager who’s already feeling burned by a series of changes doesn’t seem emotionally intelligent to me. Let Eales handle the “We’re delighted Paul has joined to set our future” stuff, and privately put everyone on notice that you’ll be observing and reviewing processes to improve them. There’s nothing to gain by giving a public interview that can’t be misinterpreted by Howe and the wider staff at the club. Once that genie’s out of the bottle, it takes time to build trust and rebuild bridges—especially in an industry known for its passion and egos.

The results speak for themselves…

While it shouldn’t be forgotten that Newcastle did complete the signing of William Osula – a striker who could look like a steal if he develops well – the aftermath of that hubris has played out poorly.

Whatever the truth about the length of shortlists and alternative targets, it seemed that, after some friction between the two, England defender Marc Guehi was a point of agreement between Howe and Mitchell. While I understand why some fans get frustrated with Howe’s conservative and expensive approach to player targeting, its results are predictable and have pushed us forward with each deal.

It was the only deal pursued so aggressively, and Mitchell reportedly backed himself to get it done with the infamously difficult Steve Parish. For what it’s worth, but for Chadi’s injury, I think the deal would have gone through – even after Anderson’s sale to Fulham – but Mitchell’s desire to secure the best possible price delayed the transfer.

In my opinion, even a moderately sized overpay to complete the deal would have been better for the long-term relationship between Howe and Mitchell. There’s nothing particularly wrong with a 6 or 7 out of 10 transfer window when you can point to the timing as an excuse for not making too many changes too quickly.

While PSR provides something of an umbrella for Mitchell to shelter under, given the Anderson/Minteh debacle, the funds for at least one major deal were available. When you amortise a fee over 5-6 years, the difference between £65m and £75m is minimal, so while Mitchell deserves some credit for sticking to what he considers the top price for the player, he has also allowed another window to pass without a significant boost for the club.

By completing the deal quickly at a higher price point, Mitchell would have also avoided painting himself into a corner where he felt compelled to give yet another interview defending the decisions made throughout the window. In doing so, he criticised the deals that helped the club achieve 4th- and 7th-placed finishes after years of battling relegation. It all feels like he’s servicing his own ego, and it has been somewhat heavy-handed so far.

I’m not trying to be overly critical of Mitchell – the hand he was dealt here was a little rough. Howe is a stubborn manager, and PIF/Eales didn’t do a good job of laying the groundwork for his arrival. At least now that the window is closed until January, there is a chance for all parties involved to reset and align. Howe has time to move into the acceptance part of the change curve, and Mitchell has a period to shape the agenda in a way that is comfortable for all parties, so that by the end of that window, he’ll have completed more transfers than interviews.

Welcome to a bite-sized opposition report on Newcastle United’s next opponent, Bournemouth AFC.

As mentioned last week, these posts aren’t supposed to be a full breakdown of every little thing that might happen across various aspects of play e.g. build-up shapes, set-pieces, out-of-possession pressing styles, etc, because doing it to the same degree as I would inside a club is impractical and would be too long for a newsletter, so instead this is your bite-sized overview of things to expect/look out for.

Current Form

Since the turn of the year, Bournemouth’s chances conceded and created have generally been getting worse. Where there was clear daylight between their xG for and against has been reduced to parity between the two metrics.

This has generally been reflected in their results during that time, where, after a lovely run of five home games in six, they began to falter as the 23/24 season reached its conclusion.

This includes the opening weekend of the new season, where they battled back to gain a 1-1 draw away at Forest in the dying embers of the game.

Team Shape & Style of Play

Against Forest, Bournemouth lined up in a 4-2-3-1 formation. Looking back at the last few months of the 23/24 season, this appears to be a settled system that Iroala prefers to start matches with. I can’t speak to every individual in-game adjustment he’s ever made, but it feels likely this is what he’ll go with.

While these are the nominal positions on the team sheet, a look at the pass networks vs. Forest reveals little. Based on their average positions with the ball, at face value, you might say there’s something of a box midfield here. But knowing that the front four was compensating for the loss of Solanke (& having looked at each man’s passing chart) it seems each of the attacking midfielders took some of the responsibility to offer options in central areas and interchanged roles with some fluidity, resulting in their average position being brought to the middle of the pitch.

A look at how they set up during the 2-2 draw at St James’ Park is perhaps a little more indicative of what we can expect when Bournemouth have the ball. Lewis Cook generally sits a little deeper leaving Alex Scott to link to the attack, while he protects the back four and keeps possession.

Generally speaking, unlike Southampton, possession isn’t a massive part of Iroala’s preferred way to attack and defend. Instead, he favours a more direct speed of play towards the opposition’s goal, with vertical passing and the pace of the wide players to carry the ball. From goal kicks, Bournemouth used a mixed approach. Though they always went short vs. Forest, when they need to they’re happy to go a little longer to a big guy up top, win the duel or second ball and play for territory like a rugby team. It’ll be interesting to see whether they risk playing through Newcastle’s press or choose to go over it.

Without the ball, Iraola’s team presses intensely all over the field. So expect the likes of Livramento, Hall, Guimaraes, Joelinton and Longstaff to be tested in Newcastle’s build-up phase which hasn’t looked great for a while. If he was fully fit and there weren’t rumours about him leaving, it’d be a game I’d be tempted to play Trippier in to help with this.

However, the return of Pope in goal is likely to mean that we’ll see a few more longer balls to the left wing to start possessions instead of playing through the press. So the onus will be on Isak/Joelinton to win the first contact and the rest of the team to win any second balls from these duels.

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When you do beat Bournemouth’s press, the rewards are plentiful. They give up 0.10xG per shot conceded and 2.5 clear shots per 90. Against Forest, that number rose to 5, as they reaped some rewards for their low-block, counter-attack style.

So where do Bournemouth leave space? Well, a look back at ‘Where Teams Allow Space’ from last season shows that wherever you try to pass through them, you’re likely to be under pressure.

That being said, Forest found a bunch of success targeting their left-hand side. Though Gordon didn’t look at his best vs. Southampton you’d fancy him to win his battle against Smith and for Joelinton to exploit any space that Alex Scott leaves too. If Newcastle’s goalscorer can bully Scott physically, then in theory Howe’s men could get some joy down that side.

Key men

In terms of specific threats, as we saw last season Semenyo HAS to be respected. He has the speed and has a growing body of evidence that he’s an above-average finisher. I do wonder whether Howe will be tempted to bring in Kelly at Left Back (if he doesn’t play him at Centre Back) to counter his threat. One to watch.

Additionally, Tavernier is perhaps an even more important player for the south coast team. While he lacks the final action output of some of his teammates his creative passing tends to be the pass before the final ball that unlocks defenses.

There’s also a chance we’ll see new signing Evanilson start the game. He’s a player with a Champions League pedigree that caused Arsenal real problems last season. He’s a real upgrade in terms of creative passing and link-up play on Solanke. How well he adapts to the Premier League in a less than dominant is an open question, but he’s a proper handful.

Conclusions

So where is this game won or lost? Well for a start Newcastle will need to use the ball better than they did in the open 30 versus Southampton. It was all a bit too sloppy and disconnected, if we start like that again Bournemouth’s press will generate shots. We’ll also need to do a better job than we did last season in managing defensive transitions. Bournemouth have a heap of pace in attacking midfield and if Evanilson does play, then whoever is marking him (be it Krafth, Burn or Kelly) will have to show him how hard it is to win duels in the Premier League. If he gives Iroala’s men a platform to process the ball vertically it’ll be tough sledding for Howe’s men.

Specifically, Joelinton vs. Alex Scott feels like the key battle for a successful time here. If the big bruiser from Brazil can bully the youngster and force him back, then it’ll restrict the quality Scott supplies to any forward players. On the same side, the 33-year-old Smith vs. Gordon (and Barnes) is another area we should be targeting, in terms of player quality it’s a real mismatch that we need to target again and again.

More generally, the silly Red Card meant that we didn’t really get a chance to see how Newcastle’s performance vs. Southampton might’ve improved as the match wore on and the team found solutions. But it did give a reminder of the stubbornness that was the hallmark of the 22/23 but went missing in 23/24. That mentality saw us lose just five games and it was nice to see the DNA of Shithouse FC still runs through the team. That DNA is what turns defeats into draws and draws into wins. While this weekend’s game is tricky to predict, I find it hard to believe we’ll be anywhere near as bad as last year’s 2-0 defeat at the Vitality Stadium.

I’ll go 1-0 to Newcastle. HWTL 🙌

Welcome to your pre-match primer for Newcastle’s first game of the season vs. Southampton at St. James’ Park.

I’m going to try to keep drafting these before each league game (though life might get in the way) and make them as short and digestible as possible, to provide you with a quick snapshot of what to expect and help you sound a bit smarter in whatever pub, WhatsApp group or social media platform you use.

End of Season Form

Coming up via the playoffs, Southampton limped into the Premier League with an attack that regressed towards the end of the season (probably due to fatigue) while their defensive metrics remained largely unchanged throughout the season.

In particular, over the final few months of the season, their form took a pretty nasty dip when their luck at both ends of the pitch ran cold after running hot for months on end in the middle of the season.

Style of Play

Russell Martin’s men tend to line up in a similar 4-3-3 shape to NUFC, however, for tricky away games they used a 5-3-2/3-5-2 system, so I’d expect that at SJP. Generally, they keep quite a high line but aren’t fierce pressers of the ball, preferring to remain organised. They do a lot of their defending with the ball and move the ball, playing out from the back, passing methodically and slowly towards the goal with more valuable progressive actions and threats coming via carries, rather than trying to break the lines with aggressive vertical passes.

I’d imagine that their out-of-possession approach may be tweaked as they move up to a higher level, so we might see them drop a few yards and not allow teams quite as much time on the ball. If they decide to play the same way, Isak, Murphy and Gordon/Barnes could have a field day running into all that delicious space.

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Key men

In terms of specific threats, the Saints have added Brereton Díaz, to their attack who lowkey did pretty well from the left wing in what was a poor Sheff Utd team.

Otherwise, Adam Armstrong and Sékou Mara are their biggest remaining goal threats, while David Brooks and Stuart Armstrong tend to be the players who unlock the defences.

Newcastle’s Fraser obviously won’t feature, though I’m almost certain troubles agreeing a fee with Southampton will evaporate quickly after the first game is done.

When fit, Brooks can cause real issues to Premier League defences, his creative passing belongs at this level and the plot of a player returning to full health after a cancer scare and excelling back in England’s top division is something I’m actively rooting for (though hopefully later in the season).

While there are some questions about whether physically he can live with Premier League-level defenders, if Hall or Burn give him too much time to pick a pass, then he’ll create a chance.

Conclusions

The main key here will be how NUFC’s aggressive press interacts with Southampton’s patient possession play and high defensive line. I’d imagine the Saints will aim to defend with five at the back, which would normally give them an extra man in the build-up. However, up against Newcastle’s intensity and aggressive man-to-man pressing system, this will be an early test to see if they stick to the principles that got them promoted.

Martin’s men were already conceding 3.04 high-press shots and an overall xG conceded of 0.95 per 90 minutes last season. Faced with the step up in quality – unless they change their approach entirely – it should be an area where Howe’s men can benefit. When you add the relative gulf in quality between the teams and the fact that Southampton’s goalkeeping department leaves a lot to be desired, it feels like anything other than a home win would be a surprise.

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But separating the things that matter from those that don’t. Separating the fact from opinion, the cool logic from emotion following a win or loss isn’t always easy – especially when you aren’t privy to behind-the-scenes information.

Instead as onlookers, we fill the knowledge void based on our own experiences with football. A resulting cognitive bias known as the Dunning–Kruger effect takes place across Twitter, podcasts and virtual pages as a mix of hot takes, trolls, joy, anger, indifference and more nuanced opinions vie for supremacy.

Within this virtual shouting match, the narratives that follow the team take root, take on a life of their own and eventually need to be addressed by the media and by extension the manager. And boy did the 23/24 season keep the masses fed, just off of the top of my head we had: “Guimaraes should be dropped”, “Newcastle can’t pay away” – both hangovers from the end of the 22/23 season – “Howe’s waits too long to make subs”, “Nick Pope’s kicking is holding us back”, “we’re mint and going to go far in Europe”, “Howe’s lost the dressing room”, “the medical team don’t know what they’re doing”, “AC Milan knew all along about Tonali”, “Injuries & fatigue are killing us” I could go on and on and on anddddd on. None of us are immune to it. We all play our part.

In my experience, keeping a close eye on the team’s performance data helps cut through the hype and negativity, to bring even an obsessive fan like me back to earth, to something closer to object truth beyond the histrionics.

So where to start? Well while past performance isn’t a foolproof way to predict the future – especially following an off-season with a relative amount of upheaval behind the scenes – there are lessons to be learned from Newcastle United’s uneven performances in 23/24.

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The league table doesn’t lie?

Before we look at Newcastle United’s underlying metrics and more advanced data, let’s remind ourselves of our final position in the league last season.

Howe’s men finished just 8pts off of the UCL spots, 11pts worse off than the 22/23 season, broke Newcastle United’s goalscoring record and conceded 29 more goals than 22/23.

When you look at the results in date order, it’s perhaps understandable how so many competing narratives took hold. In an industry famous for its whiplash nature of only being as good as your last result figuring out where the 23/24 version of Howe’s team stacked up was less than straightforward.

The worst injury record in the Premier League, is context, not an excuse…

The only thing that felt consistent last season, was the number of players Newcastle United had unavailable to play each week. It started with Joe Willock’s hangover from the previous season and Matt Targett‘s torn hamstring and didn’t ease at any point.

It was 41 separate injuries and 1,950 days of player unavailability, which doesn’t even include Tonali’s ban. While I don’t want to relitigate the cause of the injuries because all views on this have some merit – playstyle, schedule, increased load of remaining players, players determined not to miss the Euros, the need to get players back, etc – we also shouldn’t forget the same team behind the scenes managed to keep an ageing defence fit for the entire 22/23 season.

Where you sit on this spectrum of the cause of these injuries, I don’t think it’s a stretch to call a season where you suffer two ACLs, two dislocated shoulders, two lower stress back fractures, an Achilles infection morphs into a season-long absence, a weird Turf-Toe ligament injury and a gambling ban anything other than unlucky. It denied Howe the use of £100m+ worth of transfer additions for most of the season, meaning that the results delivered by a squad that going into 23/24 most Newcastle fans would say “wasn’t good enough” had to suffer.

This is context, not an excuse. There’s a difference.

What does the underlying data tell us?

So keeping all of that in mind, what can Newcastle’s EPL data from such a disrupted and difficult data tell us about what’s next? Well, for me the signs are pretty encouraging.

When you look at our 10-game rolling xG for and conceded from the end of the 22/23 and across to the 23/24 season we see a generally decent start to the new season, followed by a defensive crisis, before a recovery towards the end of the campaign.

That two months when fatigue and injuries reduced Newcastle’s ability to defend transitions to nil was brutal – barring that one home win vs. Fulham against 10 men – it was probably the worst stretch of games that Howe’s team had played following his arrival as manager. The zenith of this was on New Year’s Day at Anfield, which hung like a millstone around the team’s metrics until it finally dropped off the rolling averages in April.

Why does any data that isn’t the score matter? Well if you track xG difference to actual goal difference, the correlation – though rarely perfect – is pretty clear to see.

If we accept that we can learn something beyond the swings of luck using these underlying metrics, then we potentially get a bead on what’s next. After all, xG comes from the gambling industry’s desire to predict the game better.

So when you analyse these trendlines against the context of the injuries, schedule and results you end up with three distinct phases across the season:

1. August to the end of November: Despite the injuries and the busy schedule, the team were fresh enough to grind out results.

2. December to end of January: Injuries to key players (most notably Pope) cumulative fatigue and an unrelenting schedule made Howe’s game model impossible.

3. February to the end of the season: A break in January, some players returning and easing schedule see the team start to refind their levels.

By comparing Newcastle’s to the league average for these metrics (& more) and showing where they’re performing relative to the rest of the league across these phases, I think we’ll get some clues about what this season might look like.

August to the end of November

The start of the season was a real mixed bag. The amazing home win vs. Villa was followed up with limp performances at City and Brighton, a very annoying game vs. Liverpool where Darwin Nunez turned into prime Ronaldo for two shots and a 7-game unbeaten run. This part of the season ended with wins against Arsenal, a sign of things to come at Bournemouth and a 4-1 win against Chelsea.

Attacking Radar 🔴 vs. League average 🔵

Defensive Radar 🔴 vs. League average 🔵

As you can see, Newcastle was in pretty good shape across this period, especially in attack – though I’d like more shot volume. The lack of pace in the backline still left us a little vulnerable to counters, but generally, we were keeping teams to around 1 xG against per 90. Pretty solid.

When you look at the xG for and against the rest of the league during this period, things were pretty healthy and Howe’s team were firmly in the best of the rest after Arsenal and Man City.

December to end of January:

When we repeat the exercise for a bunch of results that are entirely too depressing to list in the same manner, we see just how sharply the collective effects of injuries/fatigue caused the wheels to come off the season.

Attacking Radar 🔴 vs. League average 🔵

Defensive Radar 🔴 vs. League average 🔵

The complete collapse of our physical ability to press the ball, make recovery runs and maintain shape when teams moved us from side to side, was evident in every minute. Interestingly, our attacking numbers remained solid and our shot volume increased, as Howe attempted to kill games early.

Coupled with the frankly concerning performances of Martin Dubravka during this period and across the rest of the season, I maintain that no matter what Howe did during this period, he didn’t have enough fit horses to materially change results in this period.

February - end of season

After a January window came and went without additions (for the PSR reasons we saw this summer) the team started to get some bodies back, players managed to get a little rest between games and while line-ups were not consistent we started to see more of players like Hall, Livramento, Lascelles, Krafth and Murphy who had played fewer minutes and were a little fresher. Things first stabilised, then improved, as a magnificent performance at Villa Park was somewhat marred by performances away to Man Utd and Chelsea. Again Dubravka’s wildly variable play put a team regaining its confidence under pressure at key moments in games.

Attacking Radar 🔴 vs. League average 🔵

Defensive Radar 🔴 vs. League average 🔵

Though not as healthy as in the first third of the season, Newcastle’s defensive recovery from what must have been a real deterioration in confidence levels during the Christmas-period collapse is low-key impressive. Again in attack, we’re seeing consistently high performance levels to end the season. It’s a credit to Howe and his staff that in most years it’d have been good enough for European football *shakes fist at Pep’s City*.

When we compare this to the wider league, we again find Newcastle United in the best of the rest territory.

Conclusions

So what does this tell us? Well generally, when not decimated by injuries Eddie Howe’s Newcastle United team has strong and broadly consistent underlying data.

While xG isn’t the be-all and end-all of team performance, it does tell us that with a fair wind, we should be in the mix for the European and Champions League spots again. Even in a year where everything that could go wrong, WENT WRONG, the floor of a squad that was missing so many key players for so long only missed out on Europe based on an unexpected cup final result.

With the addition of some pace to the back line in Lloyd Kelly (read my analysis here)  depth at striker via William Osula, (read my analysis here) and perhaps the addition of Marc Guehi and possibly a yet-to-be-named new right winger too, it feels like we’ve seen enough from Howe to suggest that Newcastle that – so long as the attacking output remains consistent – that any improvement in defensive performance will leave us well positioned to take advantage if any of the big-6 (& Villa) fail to meet the levels required.

If you pushed me for a prediction today, with just a little more luck based on last season I’d say 4th-6th feels more than achievable and might be expected from an ownership and fanbase that expects more and more with each passing season.

Fingers crossed and HWTL 🙌

I’m a chronically online person. I spend WAY too much time scrolling the feeds on Twitter looking for news of a pending Newcastle United transfer, an update about what’s next for the stadium and just generally following the wider discourse. It’s not exactly a problem, but I could do with a bit less double screening.

One of the benefits of scrolling miles of the #NUFC feeds is that you get a general vibe for topics that cause disagreements. There is one such topic at the moment: The Future of Callum Wilson.

Generally speaking, the arguments can be divided into two camps:

1. Keep him - As a bench option because “he guarantees goals” but we ‘MUST’ sign another young striker because he can’t stay fit

2. Sell him - Because though he’s a proven goalscorer, we need players that are available & we should sell rather than allow him to leave for free

Like all of the best debates, both positions have merit, so let’s explore them.

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The case for keeping Wilson

1: He scores goals

Scoring is the hardest thing to do in football. It’s why players, like Wilson, who have proven time and again that they can find the net at the highest levels of the game are so sought after.

In four seasons at Newcastle United, Wilson has scored 48 times in just 108 games, which is a great rate of return. When fit he has pace and when he is presented with a good chance, there’s a general confidence he’ll finish it.

When we look at just his Premier League data, we can see he’s performed a little better than average over these four seasons, though his overall tallies have been boosted by a decent chunk of penalties too.

2: Replacing him would be a hard task

Finding reliable Premier League goalscorers can be an expensive business. So many teams take punts on strikers with good/great-looking data and scouting reports that just don’t cut it. Despite what most armchair fans think, recruitment isn’t easy, heck Newcastle United paid 40m for Joelinton who didn’t turn out to be the striker we’d hoped for.

Even if it would be fairly easy to find another striker whose hold-up and link-up play are closer to Isak’s 🔵 , finding a striker within our price range who matches Wilson’s 🔴 expected goals (xG) numbers from limited minutes AND would be okay as a backup to Isak… is a not insignificant challenge.

3: He might be at the stage of his career where he’s happy playing less…

Now this one is pure speculation on my part and anyone who makes this a core part of their argument is entirely guessing. However, for argument’s sake, let’s say that Wilson (or his support team) recognises that his body isn’t holding up as well as it once was and they also spotted that 5 of his 9 goals came from the bench last season.

You could be led to a school of thought where accepting a role from the bench and playing fewer minutes, but against tiring legs is the best way for him to a.) get more goals and b.) use this form to leverage one final massive contract from the MLS or Saudi Pro League.

The case for selling Wilson

1: His injuries prevent him from being a reliable option

While I’m unsure that his ego will allow it, even if we convince ourselves that Wilson is happy being a dude who comes off of the bench, looks handsome, bangs one in the net, and then smiles and salutes his way into our hearts, Wilson’s durability raises serious questions.

Below is a table of the injuries he’s suffered while at Newcastle United.

That’s 85 games missed in just four seasons. He suffered five injuries last season and completed just 1159 minutes of action in the EPL. With Isak himself picking up the odd knock and pull, it feels like a game of roulette to rely on Wilson to be healthy to start when you need him. Anecdotally, it also feels like it takes him a bit longer to find his groove when he returns from injury. Perhaps the appointment of Bunce could help give you a bit more confidence, but right now it gives me the yips.

This might be less of an issue if Newcastle sign a right winger who legitimately can cover up front too, creating a pecking order of Isak, Wilson, Gordan/New right winger, but after coming off the worst season I’ve known from an injury perspective, it’s a worry.

2: Is his performance dipping?

Wilson relies on his speed, ball-carrying and off-ball movement to fashion or get on the end of chances. He likes to run in behind and has the knack of being in the right place at the right time for a tap-in.

Last season 🔵 we saw a dip in the quality of Wilson’s passing, his shot volume and he began to turnover the ball away at a higher rate than in 22/23 🔴

Now, there could be several factors behind this. Of course, Newcastle’s form suffered last season, especially during the December to end of January run where everyone was injured or knackered. However, it seems the worst of his performances came after February, though the same size for this is very small.

Without the ball, I wonder whether Howe’s pressing style is starting to take the sharper edges off of his attacking game. While Wilson recorded a higher rate of pressures and pressure regains per 90 than in 22/23, they were concentrated to a smaller area of the pitch.

When you compare this to the range of Isak’s defensive activity, the difference feels pretty stark and is perhaps another nod that the striker is physically declining.

3: Can Newcastle afford to let him leave for free?

Finally, there’s the dreaded PSR part of this equation. A few weeks ago Newcastle United were forced to sell Yankuba Minteh and Elliott Anderson to avoid a points deduction for exceeding 105m worth of losses in the previous 3-year window.

Newcastle could sell Wilson this summer and bank the profit (especially given Wilson’s contract is almost fully amortised) then use the fee to add a younger striker to the squad.

But why not keep Wilson and also add a young striker, to get the best of both worlds? Well with UEFA’s squad cost ratio rule needing Newcastle’s wage bill to be just 80% of revenues this season (down from 90% in 23/24) and will reduce to 70% for the 25/26 season, Wilson’s reportedly ‘among the top earners’ wages would make it unfeasible to carry another striker level wage on top.

What should Newcastle do?

So this brings me to what I think would be optimal for Newcastle United. So let’s talk scenarios:

Team X bids £18m+ for Callum Wilson: This is an absolute no-brainer, the decision needs to be taken for the good of the wider project to move Wilson on and reinvest in someone who could potentially fill Isak’s shoes in the longer term.

Team Y bids £10m + add-ons for Callum Wilson: The answer to this depends entirely on the replacements we believe are available in the market. For example, it’s reported that Jonathon David is available from between £25-30m this summer. Newcastle could bank the £10m fee as profit and sign David on a 5-year deal which would be amortised to just £5-6m per season, we could double his wages and this is still likely to be less than Wilson is currently paid. The extra headroom might come in useful when the club looking to renew Isak/Gordon’s contracts.

Team Z bids £5m+ performance & appearance-based add-ons: Do I want to risk annoying Eddie Howe by accepting a bid this low and having to fill his shoes without much extra in the budget? I do not.

The outcome will depend on how desperate potential buyers get in their search for a striker. The more that lower half of the table Premier League clubs miss out on younger targets the likelier it becomes we see something in the Team X and Y range, giving Newcastle a big decision to stick or twist.

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"Make it make sense." This phrase was a staple of my frustration under the previous ownership of Newcastle United Football Club. I believed those days were behind us, but recent events suggest otherwise.

Before delving into the current situation, I must acknowledge the commendable efforts of the new owners at St James’ Park. Their tenure has seen the appointment of Eddie Howe, the avoidance of relegation, the eradication of negativity, a fourth-place finish, and the acquisition of outstanding players like Guimaraes, Isak, Botman, and Gordon. They have shown themselves to be smart, engaged, and generally empathetic leaders who, despite a few hiccups, have earned considerable goodwill.

However, the events of the past 48 hours cannot be brushed under the carpet without addressing some hard questions. The process that allowed a £50-60 million PSR black hole to persist until the deadline needs scrutiny. While we are grateful for the ambition that freed us from Mike Ashley's grip, that goodwill is undermined when the aspiration to be number one is replaced by a frantic scramble to sell players to avoid a PSR-enforced points deduction.

In January, I heard rumours that Newcastle needed to 'make a sale' to meet their PSR requirements. Initially, I was shocked and sceptical. Yet, weeks of player transfer links—Trippier to Bayern, Wilson to Atletico, and Almiron to the Saudi Pro League—coupled with Darren Eales' warnings about the need to sell, confirmed the issue.

Given the injury crisis and a season hanging in the balance, Howe’s push to keep his squad intact was understandable. Managers naturally want deep squads for flexibility. With European football still a possibility, I was willing to extend the benefit of the doubt to those managing the club’s finances.

However, five months have passed. Even with an optimistic perspective, it’s hard to justify why we weren’t ready to act when the transfer window opened. Even if we accept that players like Wilson, Dubravka, Trippier, Longstaff, and Targett were too difficult to shift, two main questions remain:

1. Why did we let the shortfall grow so large?

2. Why did we delay in addressing the inevitable solution?

The only plausible answer is that they gambled and lost. This miscalculation cost us one of Europe’s brightest right-wing prospects (Minteh) and a talented young player developed at the club (Anderson). While the prices achieved for both deals were commendable, neither player would have been top of the list to move on for footballing reasons.

It’s unwise to believe everything in the football news, but equally foolish to ignore it all. Thus, when rumours about Isak and Gordon were not entirely dismissed by the local press, it had an impact. Modern players are savvy, their agents are hungry and the uncertainty could affect Gordon’s willingness to sign a new deal, given his hometown club’s potential interest, emboldened by our financial mismanagement. Furthermore, the club’s uncertainty about avoiding penalties, even after these moves and a climbdown on Dan Ashworth’s compensation, erodes trust in the process.

The collateral damage to the perception of Newcastle United's broader project is significant. I say this not to snipe for clicks or likes, but as someone who dedicates a significant portion of my free time to creating content about the club. I love Newcastle United, and gambling with its reputation is something I cannot comprehend.

Which brings me back to my original plea: “Make it make sense.”

A couple of keepers…

Amid the PSR deadline madness, Newcastle United added two new goalkeepers to the squad to replace the almost certainly outgoing Martin Dubravka and the released Lorius Karius. Now I’d done a whole heap of work on a long bit of analysis on James Trafford, which now needs binning (😭), I’m on my holiday and looking at two older backup keepers isn’t anyone’s idea of a great time so I’ll keep this brief.

Odysseas Vlachodimos

He’s a vastly experienced Goalkeeper who played more than 150 times for Benfica and has 42 caps for Greece. In his few games at Nottingham Forest, he struggled to nail down a spot in the first team playing just 5.7 nineties during which he conceded 12 goals. He definitely wasn’t helped by Forest’s rather porous defence at the time either.

He’s not a keeper who commands his area all that aggressively, throughout his career he claims infrequently and generally only when it’s very safe to do so. He’s also, not very active when it comes to sweeping behind the defence.

However, there’s enough in his data throughout his time at Benfica to show he’s a solid enough shot-stopper (see last Benfica season shots faced below) and when it comes to his in-possession work, Vlachodimos is genuinely good. He consistently completes 55% plus of even his longer passes and kickstarts counterattacks with them too.

And here’s a comparison of his last full season at Benfica to Pope during our UCL qualification year 🔽