Howe on double injury, Aston Villa display and worrying words on January signings
Our hopes of building momentum after Wednesday night's win over PSV were dealt a big blow as we fell to a 2-0 loss against Aston Villa on Sunday.
A thunderous strike from Emiliano Buendia and a late header from Ollie Watkins sealed the three points on an afternoon where we never truly looked like scoring outside of the opening minute.
It’s left Eddie Howe with a tough selection headache over who should play in Paris on Wednesday night, as barring some bright moments from Lewis Miley and Sven Botman, it was a poor performance from much of our XI.
Here’s what the gaffer had to say after the game, discussing the result, performance and injury latest:
https://youtu.be/qjRH8XvpIM4?si=EN0O-lRUZ_3AOUzB
On the performance
For the most part, neither team truly excelled, but it came down to Villa capitalising on the few opportunities they had and seeing the game out, with Emery's side limiting us to few chances after taking the lead.
“Our performance was okay, a lot of good bits in there, good individual performances. But we've lost the game and it's one of fine margins.“Missed opportunities for us. Sandro has that chance at the start and if it goes in it's a different game.
“I thought we were better in the second half than we were in the first. It’s a difficult one for us because there were chances and moments without our final ball being at the quality it normally is.
“Our crossing was poor today. We had a lot of crossing opportunities and good moments around their box.”
“We are well aware that we had a lot of the ball, a lot of potential moments for us, maybe not the number or sheer weight that you need to turn the game in our favour.
“But we’re being very self-critical, we’re analysing where we need to, and we’re trying to learn from it.”
On Bruno and Joelinton injury woes
The worst thing Newcastle wanted to happen ahead of the PSG game was club captain Bruno Guimaraes to be forced off injured against PSV. Perhaps the second worst thing was Joelinton being similarly forced off with a groin concern against Aston Villa.
Faced with the prospect of two of his three go-to midfielders being out for the biggest game of the season, Howe issued a disappointing update on the Brazilians’ current fitness and whether or not they’ll be able on Wednesday night.
On Bruno and his hopes of playing at PSG, Howe noted:
“I still don't think it's a serious injury. He wasn't quite there today. I know he'll do everything he can to be fit for Wednesday. Let's wait and see. He has to be right to play”
On Joelinton, Howe seemed concerned despite not knowing the severity of his groin issue:
“It looks like a groin problem. A big blow for us to lose him at any stage. We hope it's not too serious."With him and Bruno missing, that's sort of a double blow for us.”
No signings coming?
The same question continues to be asked by fans: when Bruno is absent, where can we expect the creativity to come from?
A toothless performance from Anthony Gordon and Yoane Wissa didn’t help us today, but Howe has shot down the idea of a January arrival to solve this issue, hinting that the summer will be our next opportunity to reshape the squad.
“We have the players we have and we need to find a solution with those players. There’s no point in me thinking we need another type of player at this point because it’s not going to happen.“The next chance we have to change the squad is the summer so it’s about getting the best out of the players we have.”
Judging by Howe’s words, it’s unlikely we’re going to see any big names, if any names at all, through the doors by the time the transfer window shuts next week.
