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Eddie Howe is having a difficult period of his Newcastle United tenure. There are some in the fan base that are starting to question him.
The vast majority are still behind him and for good reason. He has a lot of credit in the bank. In his first season, he oversaw a climb in the table that few believed was possible. Then, he followed it up with a fourth-place finish and earned the club Champions League football for the first time in decades.
However, that doesn’t mean he is above criticism and the last few weeks have seen some very poor performances. Poor runs of form happen and there are plenty of extenuating circumstances that are impacting our season. The main one being injuries, which will hamper us until the end of the campaign with Joelinton, Callum Wilson and Nick Pope still absent.
Plenty of players have had to play more minutes than would be ideal, while others are short of match fitness. Coupled together, that makes it look like the team is flagging as a whole. With players coming back, that will improve, but there will still be lingering impacts.
One of the big issues is that Howe is doing little to change the style of play, despite our identity being lost. Out of possession, there are big gaps to exploit and we look vulnerable whenever we turn the ball over. Blackburn Rovers, Luton Town, Bournemouth and Nottingham Forest have all had a lot of joy in transition against us. You can forgive the odd bad game, but it is the new norm that we are conceding several chances every game.
Howe has been assertive in his press conferences that it is only necessary to change the system if the issues are system related, which he isn’t sure that they are. If the examples were few and far between, it would point to individual errors. If the team is struggling every week and the same issues are occurring (as is the case now), it would suggest the system is causing problems.
I agree with Howe that the system isn’t worth throwing out of the window. It has…
Source link : https://www.nufcblog.co.uk/2024/02/28/howes-biggest-mistake-becomes-clear-after-blackburn-clash-time-to-change-it-eddie/
Author : Jake Jackman
Publish date : 2024-02-28 15:12:55
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