Eddie Howe fears psychological blow cost Newcastle in 7-2 battering at Barcelona

Newcastle United's Champions League dream is over after Barcelona ran riot in the second half at the Camp Nou on Wednesday night.

Barcelona and Newcastle put on a spectacular display of frantic football in the first half. It was end-to-end stuff, and there was a real feel of 'anything you can do we can do better' as Newcastle fought back twice after going a goal behind.

Unfortunately, there wasn't enough time left in the first half to respond to Barca's third, following another stoppage-time penalty goal from Lamine Yamal.

Looking back, that goal seven minutes into the three minutes of stoppage time (sound familiar?) really had a detrimental effect on Newcastle's mentality heading into a brutal second half, as Eddie Howe admitted in his post-match interview.

Howe: Late goal killed Toon spirit

Speaking to the media after tonight's battering in Barcelona, Eddie Howe admitted that Barcelona's third goal may have been the moment the tie got away from us.

The boss fears that Yamal's stoppage time goal took the stuffing out of his side, believing we did not recover psychologically and suffered badly after the break as a result.

"Psychologically, that was a tough one (third goal). Right on half-time, again the last kick, very similar to what happened at the end of the game in the first leg.

"We should have been going in at half-time with a great feeling. Anything was possible.

"And then they score quite quickly after half time. Psychologically we didn't recover from that moment. The second half was tough. It was a painful experience"

Howe also spoke to TNT Sports at full-time, discussing a game that was "really strange to sum up" after a strong start turned into a second half collapse.

"Really strange to try and sum that up"

Eddie Howe reacts to Newcastle's 7-2 loss against Barcelona 🗣@msmith850 | @tntsports & @discoveryplusUK pic.twitter.com/zIbCQo0ihE

— Football on TNT Sports (@footballontnt) March 18, 2026

There's work to be done before Sunday

It was a damaging night for Newcastle's confidence after building up following last week's display against Barcelona and the win over Chelsea on Saturday, especially with such a huge game on the horizon on Sunday.

It's going to take some doing for Eddie Howe to turn the mood around in the camp before Sunday, although in all honesty, it shouldn't be difficult to whip up the lads to get up for taking on Sunderland.

We're sure that the likes of Dan Burn, Lewis Hall and Jacob Murphy will be making it very clear just what's at stake in this game, especially after this second-half horror show.