Results matter more to Clark than armband
CIARAN Clark insists he is not focused on personal glory during his stint as Newcastle United captain. The Toon defender netted a crucial goal against West Bromwich Albion on Tuesday night before rallying his troops to a 2-2 draw. With Jamaal Lascelles injured and the Irishman a better choice than Jonjo Shelvey as skipper in the eyes of some fans, Clark is enjoying his new role – but the former Aston Villa captain is more bothered about league points. He said: “It was obviously great to get a goal and captain the side. Jamaal is out injured, but hopefully he can get back as soon as possible. “It was great for me to captain the team and get the goal, but at this stage, we don’t care who scores. “We’ll take goals from anyone, and it’s obviously nice to chip in.” Clark played well against the Baggies and should keep his place for the trip to Chelsea.
But he feels that the presence of Matt Ritchie – whose free-kick was diverted in for Newcastle’s equaliser – will also be crucial at Stamford Bridge.
He said: “He (Ritchie) puts great quality onto his deliveries.
“West Brom are a big side, but I think they found it hard to defend the balls he was putting into the box. If we can keep that consistency going now, and keep trying to create chances, hopefully that consistency will be there and we can go and score more goals.”
A trip to the reigning champions will not be easy and Newcastle have a bad record at Stamford Bridge. But Clark is approaching the game in upbeat manner.
He said: “We know it’s going to be tough with the games we have coming up. “Every game in this league is very difficult, but we have to take some encouragement from the game in the week and be positive going into the next run of fixtures. “We’ll get ready for the game on Saturday, which is going to be a very tough one.” Clark believes the Magpies can get something if they show the same determination as the trip to West Brom. He added: “I thought we were comfortable throughout the first half, but the same sort of thing happened again late in the first half. “Going in at 1-0 down was obviously disappointing, but we knew we had to come out in the second half and try to put a performance on. “We tried that, but then they got the second one which obviously made it more difficult. “I think we showed the character in the squad though, and managed to come back to get the point, which was brilliant.
“We knew we had to get something out of the game. We made it very difficult for ourselves, but the strength of character that we showed was massive.
“We’ll take real positivity and encouragement from that. We have to learn from our mistakes, but we could have gone on and won by the end and we have to take the positives from that.
“I felt that if the game had gone on another 10 or 15 minutes, we would have gone on and got the win.
“We’re pleased with that, we’ll take that, and we’ll get ready for Saturday.”
Newcastle fans were fantastic at the Hawthorns and even when their side went 2-0 down the noise levels simply increased.
Clark said: “The fans have always stuck by us. That was a tough spell we’d gone through, and before the game, we knew we had to get something out of it.
“Even when we were 2-0 down, the fans were singing and really egging us on. It was great for us to be able to get the two goals in front of them and get the point at the end of the night.”
At this stage, we don’t care who scores. We’ll take goals from anyone, and it’s obviously nice to chip in Ciaran Clark