Yanks very much
In the end it wasn't so straight forward then.
A game that has got morale boosting home win written all over it ends up producing nothing.
To be honest most people wouldn't feel much better even if we'd drawn against Fulham.
Two goals from American duo Brian McBride and Carlos Bocanegra killed off United and their opening strike from Scott Parker.
A point would have been better than nothing but shouldn't Newcastle United be seeing off teams like Fulham in a comfortable manner?
Even when Fulham equalised today I bet they would have been delighted with a point, especially after being trounced on their last big day out at Man U 5-1.
Chris Coleman and Co were obviously delighted to get the win but where does it leave United now?
A UEFA Cup trip to Tallinn, that's where.
But even if Newcastle do actually do the job correctly against Levadia Tallinn on Thursday, it will only paper over some serious cracks.
There are still questions to be answered, such as where was the marking against Fulham for both of the goals? Why couldn't we show enough conviction to kill off Fulham at 1-0, even though we had Shola Ameobi, Guiseppe Rossi and Oba Martins at our disposal?
After Tallinn it will be a trip to West Ham, where Tevez and Co will be lurking in the East End of London.
Once that's done and dusted though, will United have added to the three points picked up already?
Let's hope so.
So much for positive mental attitudes huh?
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Lee Ryder - Proudly born and bred on Tyneside, the Chronicle's chief sports writer has followed the fortunes of the club over the last three decades as a Toon fan and football writer.
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"Why couldn't we show enough conviction to kill off Fulham at 1-0, even though we had Shola Ameobi, Guiseppe Rossi and Oba Martins at our disposal?"
Are you joking Lee?! Ameobi had the touch of a rapist today, as usual. Martins still is totally unproven, as is Rossi the Italian Chopra. We are very weak up front, and even weaker in defence. Roeder needs to stop criticising the defence and do something about it. It's no use blaming our current defenders after bidding for other teams' defenders are are no better - it is Roeder's responsibility to either sign better ones or coach our current ones properly.
What a joke, I'm gutted. We were so poor, for 80 minutes, were were on top, dominating, and then we collapsed. When will our defence learn, Roeder needs to sort it out and quick. Let me down again. Titus Bramble, WHY play him, WHY??? Just when you think we're on the road to a good season, we lose 2 out of first 3, Martins has been off key, Rossi comes on and hardly has a touch and we concede two in 8 minutes to lose at home to Fulham, a team we should be beating easily. Its a joke. And the problem being, our next games include two tough away games at West Ham and Liverpool, before we play Everton at home. It's going to be really really tough. And hopefully not, but it might be that we end of near the bottom. We needed to win today.. Im gutted. Sort it our Roeder, before the fans are on your back.
im sure today was only a blip, keep the chins up we`ll be ok.should have won today,shame we lost scottie
how many times have we seen Newcastle dominate a game and come away with nothing? Today was no exeption, they have no killer punch up front, they should go on and finish teams off, but they lack fire power, whereas at the back we have the equivalent of a sucker punch in our central defenders. Who was Bramble marking for that second goal? The first goal was bad enough but the second was a gift. Bramble has to be the worst center back in the premiership Footnote.... G R did not want Cambell on a free [ ask Portsmouth what they think of him?] and instead buy a washed up Frenchman from Man city! Panic buying or what!
Well it goes to prove NUFC are certainly not good enough for the PL. Without decent defenders it will be a long hard slog until January,when the transfer window opens.FS should leave and it only goes to prove GR is not the man for the job, anyone could see we needed to strengthen our defence but this never happened and it will be our downfall. I feel GR should leave before FS uses him as a scapegoat later in the season.
It is beyond a joke. Martins for me has done nothing to convince me he is worth ã10 million pouunds. Ameobi is not fully match fit and is still recovering from injury and too much is expected of Duff.
Its time to be honest everyone. I cant hide my anger at the way Newcastle keep losing their points. Here is what I truely think about the new players at our disposal. Martins, its true he is the fastest striker in the world, but he aint someone we can depend on. In Intermilan, the nigerian was simply a second choice and only played 20 minutes everymatch. Damien Duff, with all my respect to him, but N'Zogbia can do much more and we truely didnt need any midfielder this season, our midfield is great and this 5M could have gone on a striker. All the other new players this season arent even worth commenting on except maybe Rossi who I think will play an important role this season.
To make a long story short, Newcastle needs one goal machine, thats all, in toher words a finisher.
IT`S NO GOOD COMPLAINING ABOUT THE DEFENCE ROEDER HAS KNOWN THIS ALL ALONG AND HAS NOT RECTIFIED IT I`M AFRID WE`LL BE RELIGATED THIS SEASON
If we can not beat Fulham at HOME...WHO CAN WE BEAT ??????
Long world cup balls up to mini martins and limping shola just meant an easy day at the office for toon target zak knight. Parker isn't my favourite player to be honest. He was class yesterday and deserved man of the match,but whenever Newcastle are in a rut it's always the grafters who stand out and for me that spells bad news for all of us. I hope and pay Dyer comes back in the next 2 weeks and puts in a full season. He owes us a lot and he can save our season to be honest. Glenn has to have a look at the midfield. Duff left, Parker and Zog in the middle and Nobby right would be my selection. Give Dyer a forwards role alongside Shola (only if fit) or Martins and play the ball to there feet and into the channels. We lapsed in concentration at the back yesterday. I like Titus when he's on form, but he had no excuses yesterday. I could not believe that he had his back to Mcbride as he tucked the ball past Given. Thought Ramage had his best game at full back yesterday until the slip for the first goal. We need to get behind the lads at St James. To many people were in a coma.Sad to see fans fighting each other in the Leazes End to. A sad inditement of the football the team is serving up at present when the fans woulds rather fight each other than watch the game.
Yes, it only seems like yesterday since Lee was telling us, and there was great agreement and nodding of heads, that we had the best midfield for years. I still disagree, and it was midfield and the strikers who lost us this game not the defense.
How many shots did we have on target all game? How many chances did we create? How many balls to the feet of the schoolboy Martins to use his pace? How we collapsed when Parker left the field.
Emre walked the game, Martins never ran.
Our defense will no doubt, as all defenses do, give away goals but it is our lack of attacking ability which will be our downfall yet again this season.
Best midfield Lee? My bottom!
Oh dear,
martins will need better service than on saturday, ameobi must be pointy the way it bounces off him,
dont put home the possesion advantage and bramble doesnt do enough : instead of boumsong (who incidentally started off his juve career with a nice wee misundertanding with kovac to allow an equaliser)
Hi Lee. Well as I suspected we are going to struggle. Life is tough in the
Premiership if you cant win your home games. It was essential we got a
result against Fulham as the next 4 games look particularly daunting. We
have away games against West Ham,Liverpool,and Manchester United, with a
home game thrown in against Everton just for good measure. As much as I love
Newcastle I think we may very well get nothing at all from those 4 games
,Which means we are going to find things very difficult come mid October.
There are no easy games in the premiership and we have definitely got a very
poor defence. Generally yesterday we had most of the ball,but only when
Bullard went off injured as up to that point he was terrific in midfield.
Our weaknesses stood out a mile, we are very lightweight up front with no
one capable of holding the ball and creating space for others,dare I say it
what Shearer used to do for us all the time.If we have not got players with
the ability to hold the ball up and create space then we need to pass and
run into open spaces very quickly, As Cloughie used to say, pass the ball
where the man is not,so as the man can run on to the ball . { very much the
Bob Paisley pattern in his hey days at Liverpool } As you will recall
Liverpool were one of the greatest masters of the art in the Eighties and
had this pass and run philosophy,of course they bought players who could
always do this,and they did it to perfection.All of our current strikers
have no ability to trap and pass the ball like like they need to,and none of
them have the ability to hold the ball up, consequently up front we get
caught in no mans land and we allow defenders to tackle us very quickly and
invariably get tackled out of the situation and robbed of the ball. The
current strike force is just too lightweight in this respect, Ameobi is not
able to think fast enough with the ball at his feet and most times because
of his slowness of thought he then loses the ball and attacks break down in
the area where we could hurt the opposition.Martins I think you will agree
has had a rough baptism and again though I think his speed of thought may be
faster than Ameobis, he has not the physical strength to withstand the
onslaught of tackles he will face as a front man in the premiership.In
essence we do not have the craft and physical strength we need up front,so
we need to pass and move swiftly. This was not in evidence yesterday,hence
Martins and Ameobi were frequently caught in possession and robbed of the
ball. The only person currently at United able to hang on to and release the
ball to the open space is Kieran Dyer who of course remains on the sick
list. This is because Dyer has the ability to do this and he is a special
player,whether we ever see him again remains unclear. Defence wise we are
totally lacking,no real ability to direct headers to the right place,no
commanding presence in the central defensive danger area, and very little
ability to play our way out of defence in a constructive fashion. { high
booted balls simply come straight back to us 1 Ameobi cant hold them up,does
not win enough headers,and cant direct them anyway. 2 Martins has no chance
of receiving good balls by this method and indeed on yesterdays performance
never will } At the moment we look very poorly taught and some of the basics
are not even in evidence. The balance of the team is awful and it should
have been corrected during the close season not necessarily with multi
million pound signings but with players who can do may be one or two
things,but can do those one or two things well to benefit the team as a
whole.I have doubts about the coaching tactics and I have serious doubts
about the current balance of the team
. It is not rocket science to get it right but I dont know if we have the
players to do it. Glen must be tearing his hair out. He needs our support
more than ever now as the next few weeks are going to be tough. Ray Wilson
In response to Oxboy's comments about the midfield.
Scott Parker was inspirational in midfield and you admit yourself that we collapsed when he went off.
Damien Duff was hardly shirking out of the battle either.
Charles N'Zogbia and Emre will though have better days ahead, although Emre linked up superbly with Parker for the opening goal I believe.
And if you have been down to the reserves to watch Alan O' Brien, we have another quality option, a player who has already broke on to the international scene.
Yes we were poor against Fulham overall but the midfielders aren't the first people to point fingers at after Saturday.
And in response to Adam's post, yes, I do expect a ã10million striker, a player of great promise in Rossi and Shola - who has a goal every other game since GR took over - to threaten Fulham at home whether it be in the first minute from 25 yards or in the last minute from two inches.
I take it you won't be celebrating when Martins gets his first goal?
Maybe he should give Saviola a bell and ask for some tips huh?
Now then now then! I never made it a secret that I'd have prefered Saviola and Kuyt to Martins, but I never said I wasn't going to get behind Martins like I do with all our signings. And yes, of course I will be celebrating his first goal! (By the way, just because he cost us ã10m does not mean he is guaranteed to be a good player - look at players like Guivarch, Andersson, etc)
My simple point is that our attack isn't producing at the moment. As has been mentioned here already, we don't have the strength or craft - Ameobi's job is mainly to win headers and hold up the ball, but too often he seems incapable of doing either. Martins needs better service before he can use his pace effectively. And dare I say it, he doesn't have the ability come deep, get the ball and link up play, like Saviola does :)
But what options do we have - Roeder has no faith in Luque, god only knows what he thinks of Milner (and vice versa), Rossi I'm sure is more of a backup for Martins than a partner, so perhaps Sibierski could have a go in Shola's place?
One other thing I will say is that, as has been said already, the service was rubbish. But do we blame the defence or the midfield? Do the defence have enough options to play the ball short? Maybe it's the midfield who need to improve their movement, come deep more often etc? Or maybe our defenders are simply making bad decisions to lump the ball long every time? GR needs to confront the issue either way.
As Roeder said after the game, 'Two defensive errors, two goals and three points to Fulham, I cannot keep saying that after just about every game. Something will have to be done.'
In respect to that just who was the central defender responsible for marking McBride? Titus? Craig Moore? Bramble seems to be the one who lost his concentration again. If so he must be dropped. All his many skills, and he has plenty, are nothing if he is unable to mark his man. Both goals came from an unmarked centre forward who for eighty minutes looked barely a threat. To give him at least ten yards space twice in eight minutes is unforgivable.
My sympathy goes out to Scott Parker who once more played his heart out.
Why do we still continue to hoof long balls up to our midget strikers?
Shock , Horror , Newcastle have a poor defence,not much fire power and no cutting passes from midfield .This is what we have been discussing on this blog for two months now. Everyone has had a blast at critisising the team and every one has suggested solutions,but the reality is we all knew our failings before the season kicked off and even more so after the transfer deadline passed.Most of us showed that unique optimism only Newcastle fans posses (me more than others)and hoped this would be the season were we emulated the days of Keegan.
Sadly the realisation is slowly starting to hit home.We have on paper a top seven side but as with a lot of previous seasons we have started poorly,i am not saying we wont finnish in the top seven but(and a big but)Glen needs to get us playing and pretty quick ,as previously said January cant come quick enough and big fred needs to splash out.Moping about our lack of signings and who we might or might not buy wont help our plight but it will keep this blog busy.I personally with a bit of luck and a lot of support fancy us to get 4 points out of our next four games and if achieved should be enough to build enough confidence to start and climb the table,if we fail (and many on here expect us to) to get anything from our next four games then it will be a long lonley slog till january for Glen and the threat of Freds hatchet will start to rear its now familiar head.The jury is still out on Martins but he has not looked convicing as yet and like a certain maccaroni down the road may need a season to adapt.
Enough of the doom and gloom and lets look forward to Thursday night where we will win convincingly, and every ones spirits will be lifted , glen will be the right man for the job,Martins will have been a snip , Shola will be heading for the all time top scorer in europe , and Bramble will be showing the form that once made him a future England centre half.....well maybee not but this is Newcastle and anything can happen...........Jackie
after reading all these comments i have to say i think you are all whingers,i know we lost on saturday but we didnt play that badly i agree that the defensive errors should be stopped glenn being a central defender in the past should be sorting that out i prefer steven taylor and craig moore in defence to be honest.the midfield was ok i like the idea of duff being on the right and n`zogbia on the left i think if dyer does fully recover this time i think he will get emre`s place in the team as for the strikers it was the first time shola and martins had played together,by the way why was milner not in 16,is there no decent strikers in our reserves,what about carl finnigan he seems to know the the goal is could try hi out sometime during the season
TITuS BRAMBLE HAS TO GO ...HES BACK TO HIS COLAMITY JAMES PLAY AND THATS NO GOOD FOR US WEVE GOT WEST HAM SUNDAY AND LIVERPOOL FOLLOWING WEDNESDAY.....GOD HELP US.
Your home page its great