Help is not a hope it’s an absolute necessity!
THE BUBBLE OF OPTIMISM HAS ABSOLUTELY BURST
EVERYTHING has changed - new owners, new manager, new England international.
Yet nothing has changed - 21 games played for only one victory, knocked out of the league cup and now FA Cup at home, 43 goals conceded with the floodgates wide open.
A powder puff attack which would fail to burst a paper bag.
Eddie Howe has said, as politically he must I guess, that he has faith in these Newcastle players. Well no one else has.
How can they? The only consistency is failure.
An enormous turnout for a cup tie against third-tier opposition of 46,000 devoted Geordies saw them return home convinced that relegation looms large on the horizon.
The bubble of optimism has well and truly been burst. The improved performance last time out against Manchester United, the signing of La Liga winner and England star Kieran Trippier, and a transfer window bubbling with anticipation counted for nought upon the final whistle at a stunned SJP. Newcastle 0 Cambridge 1.
What a humiliation. What a shock. How predictable!
File it alongside Hereford and Bedford Town, Stevenage and Oxford, Luton and Grimsby, Exeter, Chester and Carlisle.
Habitual losers Watford are next up back here on Saturday when Premier League survival could hang on the result yet, unless a centre-forward is signed before then all will be doom and gloom on the terraces.
A centre-half would not go amiss either, considering United offer up goals like confetti in the wind and cannot score them to save their lives. Which they show no inclination to do.
If the worry is paying over the odds here’s the question: what is the alternative? Championship football.
What we had here was Allan Saint-Maximin doing his Strictly Come Dancing routine, Miggy Almiron running around like a headless chicken, Sean Longstaff unable to pass to a black and white shirt, Joelinton reverting to nature, Martin Dubravka looking as safe as a top hat in a high wind, Fabian Schar making a lie of his status as a qualifier for the World Cup finals, a joke goal conceded through mass panic, and three attempts to find a centre-forward with absolutely no impact whatsoever.
What was also puzzling on a day of confusion was that Jacob Murphy, who had looked the most likely to manufacture a breakthrough, was the first to be hooked while others stayed the course.
The absence of Callum Wilson is both disastrous and totally foreseeable given his injury record.
United started off with SaintMaximin through the middle, then gave Murphy a go, and finally shoved Ryan Fraser into the central firing line.
So desperate did they become that a hobbling Dubravka finally ventured forth into the opposing penalty area for a set piece when nought remained but glaring, inevitable defeat.
Just to rub salt into a gaping wound Cambridge’s winner was scored by Joe Ironside, a regular old fashioned centre-forward born in Middlesbrough who used to watch matches at SJP where his hero was Alan Shearer.
Yes, their Bulgarian keeper Dimitov Mitov pulled off a trio of top drawer saves but then custodians inevitably have a blinder in giant killings.
Chairman Yasir Al-Rumayyan had flown in no doubt encouraged by Amanda to witness the turning of a relentless tide following the sell out of SJP when originally the top tier was to remain closed and the feelgood factor created by Trippier’s arrival.
By the end he knew exactly how tough the job ahead will be and maybe ended up wondering whether a long-protracted takeover had really been such a good idea, but then the sunshine of Madrid must have seemed attractive to Trippier when compared to the ice cold reality of life on the Tyne.
The public face is one thing, private thoughts very much another.
Howe had stated pre-match that this was a ‘must win’ game but, after being exposed by his players, had changed tack to declare United must ‘take defeat on the chin’ and move on.
It was literally a knockout punch Eddie. Now try significantly lifting morale and convincing losers that victory can be theirs when Watford come to town for the battle of the deadbeats. Help is not just a fervent hope it is an absolute necessity.