Magpies must take all their chances now... or we despair
THERE ARE SOME WINNABLE GAMES AHEAD
CHRISSIE is a time for posers and puzzles to test your little grey cells, which perhaps have been lured into a light snooze by early rounds of mince pies and ginger wine.
So may I engage your thoughts for a moment to ask you to come up with the common denominator in these three clusters of football matches.
First: Aston Villa (a), Southampton (h), Manchester United (a), Leeds (h), Watford (a) and Wolves (a).
Next look at Brighton (a), Brentford (h), Arsenal (a), Norwich (h), Burnley (h), Leicester (a).
And finally peruse if you will these six: Everton (a), Southampton (a), Watford (h), Leeds (a), Everton (h), and Aston Villa (h).
The answer to my question is virtually all those 18 matches are winnable not just by Champions League opposition – but any half decent team.
Indeed I would venture that only two of the 18 – Man U and Arsenal away – could be deemed as anywhere near an opposition banker.
Yet Newcastle United only managed to win one of the first dirty dozen taking three points from 18 on offer in their initial futile attempt to harvest a decent crop and six points from the following 18 offered on the bounce.
That goes down in anyone’s book as two hugely wasted opportunities, which is why United are deep in the relegation mire of course. Now once we get rid of Man U’s visit the Magpies are about to embark on their third run of matches offering up a genuine opportunity to rack up points and they had better produce a healthy return this time or, brother, they are down.
Hopefully United will have extra help rather than relying on a squad as easy to herd into a pen – the loser’s enclosure – as a flock of sheep dictated to by a crafty dog.
The transfer market opening its doors on January 1 offers up the welcome thought of reinforcements riding over the crest of the hill. What a delicious sight that would be.
So providing the Covid pandemic doesn’t bite deep and disrupt all plans how many points out of the 18 up for auction yet again will our Misfiring Magpies claim this time to make or break a Geordie season? It had better be more than three or six!
Interestingly Rafa Benitez could
Eddie, be steady. Splash the cash Amanda. We are entering ... the Last Chance Saloon John Gibson
be beaten twice, which would be massively ironic, while it’s another chance to defeat the other four that first time round were all squandered. Watford are the immediate safety target and therefore MUST be overcome while the sinners of Southampton and Leeds’ erratic performers have to be kept within overhauling distance. Opportunities like these are not
going to keep coming around. Take them now or despair.
For example if Newcastle don’t fashion survival before the season’s end then they will surely die with a run-in that throws up Liverpool (h), Manchester City (a) and Arsenal (h) before a potential gone-or-glory final day away to fellow relegation rivals Burnley. Do we want to rely on that quartet of matches?
So there we are Eddie, be steady. Splash the cash Amanda. We are entering that drinking establishment known as the Last Chance Saloon.
And by the way Eddie if United are to be steady please refrain from continuing with Matt Ritchie and Ciaran Clark in a back line so porous it has leaked a damning 41 goals in just 18 matches.
Ritchie does not possess the defensive awareness of a natural leftback, which he has never been, and consequently many goals are leaked from his territory, while Clark is a walking liability I’m afraid.