Is this a fire drill?” the away end crowed. There were still seven minutes to go, but a number of Geordies had seen enough as West Ham fans waved them off. Unlike the corresponding fixture last season, a dramatic comeback was not on the cards. Newcastle United suffered a painful 2-0 defeat
This was ultimately a tale of two boxes at St James’ Park. If Newcastle’s defending for Tomas Soucek’s opener and Aaron Wan-Bissaka’s second was bad enough, at the other end, the black-and-whites had 18 shots, 40 touches in the opposition box and eight corners yet could only muster two measly efforts on target.
A ‘very honest’ Eddie Howe made his feelings clear to the players afterwards on what captain Bruno Guimaraes called a ‘night to forget’. Even at this early stage of the campaign, the returning Callum Wilson recognised Newcastle had ‘let that opportunity slip through our fingers’ in the Magpies’ first game after the international break.
Rather than moving within two points of champions Manchester City, in second place, Newcastle sit in 10th – just three points clear of a supposedly struggling West Ham side. Can they really have any complaints?
In a season where Newcastle have found a way to pick up results against Manchester City, Arsenal and Spurs, the black-and-whites have been defeated by West Ham, Fulham and Brighton and failed to beat Bournemouth and Everton. Newcastle have no divine right to defeat anyone in this league – that’s the beauty of the division – but if the Magpies are to be a serious European contender, Howe’s team have to pick up more points when the onus is on them to dominate.
“We haven’t grabbed the games in these moments as well as we could have done,” Howe admitted. “Of course, they present a different challenge to us mentally, tactically and technically.
It’s easy to say in hindsight, but if we score the first goal, the feeling and the result is probably very different because I thought there was a decent feeling about the group before the game. There was a decent vibe in our early exchanges in the game so I thought we were set for a good performance here, but then the reality of what we delivered was totally different.
“You’ve got to be careful that you don’t look at the game wrongly and overreact to the result, but I’m ultimately disappointed we haven’t found a way to win that game tonight.”
