Newcastle United ended their away-day woes with a thumping 4-1 win at Goodison Park on Saturday.
Despite the strong attacking performance, most of the Fantasy talk surrounded the Magpies’ goalkeeping position. Was this a changing of the guard between the posts?
HOWE ON POPE INJURY + RAMSDALE DISPLAY
Eddie Howe had the ‘Nick Pope (£5.2m) v Aaron Ramsdale (£4.8m)’ debate made easier for him by the former suffering a groin injury.
The under-fire Pope missed out altogether against Everton, with Ramsdale handed his Magpies league debut instead.
Howe wouldn’t be drawn on whether Pope would have started had he been fit.
“Good try! That’s something for me to know.
“Nick, we’re disappointed to lose him. We can’t afford to lose any player. He suffered an injury just towards the end of training. I didn’t name the team yesterday. So, we were just training as normal and he was just, I think, wrong-footed on a shot and just felt something in his groin. More after training than sort of in that moment.
“I hope he’s not out for long. We need him back. He’ll have a scan in the next few days to find the damage.” – Eddie Howe on whether Nick Pope would have started had he not been injured
As for Ramsdale’s debut, it went smoothly enough. His distribution is definitely his forte, and Newcastle played to that strength: he attempted more passes (31) and made more successful passes (21) than Pope has done in any match this season.
As for his ability with his hands, he wasn’t overly tested. Just two shots on target, one of which was Kiernan Dewsbury-Hall‘s (£4.9m) brilliantly taken consolation.
“Aaron, I think, showed his qualities with the ball at his feet today. He distributed the ball very well. He was not overly worked necessarily in terms of shots but what he did have to handle, I thought he did well.” – Eddie Howe on Aaron Ramsdale
Also missing out was Sven Botman (£4.9m), who has a niggling back issue. Howe said he is “going to see a specialist” to determine the extent of the problem.
MORE ROTATION TO COME FROM HOWE?
Not always keen on rotation (remember how he ran his players into the ground in 2023/24), Howe looks more prepared to chop and change this season.
He made six alterations from the midweek defeat in Marseille, with Ramsdale for Pope one of them. As for the other five, four of the incoming players – Lewis Hall (£5.2m), Anthony Elanga (£6.6m), Lewis Miley (£4.4m) and Nick Woltemade (£7.4m) – delivered at least one attacking return.
Miley and Hall both supplied crosses that the ever-brilliant Malick Thiaw (£4.9m) headed home, while Miley and Woltemade both found the net in between. Elanga teed up the German for his nicely lobbed strike.
Harvey Barnes (£6.3m) and Jacob Ramsey (£5.3m), sharing left-wing duties, had big chances to score other goals.
Howe was pleased with the impact of his fresher players.
“We made changes because I wanted no fatigue on the pitch. I didn’t want the feeling I had after the Brentford game, the West Ham game, where I felt we were tired and lethargic.
“So, with that in mind, I think we have to trust the squad and use the squad – and they repaid that faith.” – Eddie Howe
So, there’s a good chance we’re going to see some more tweaks in Gameweek 14. Sandro Tonali (£5.4m) surely returns, while there’s a very strong possibility of Fabian Schar (£5.3m) coming back in and Dan Burn (£5.1m) moving to left-back as Hall continues to be handled carefully after his recent lay-off. Hall had “a bit of cramp” when being replaced in stoppage time.
Anthony Gordon (£7.2m) and Jacob Murphy (£6.1m) could be back on the flanks, too.
Thiaw looks the safest route into the backline at present. The newly fit-again Hall and Tino Livramento (£4.9m) have been hugely influential in Newcastle’s last two league results but Thiaw, with his set-piece threat and occasional DefCon returns, looks the better Fantasy bet.
IDRISSA A MISS?
Was it simply a case of Idrissa Gana Gueye (£5.4m) being a miss? He may not have stopped two set-piece headers or a Jordan Pickford (£5.5m) error for Miley’s strike.
But replacement Tim Iroegbunam (£4.9m) has to share some blame for the second and third Newcastle goals, which were aided by his poor touch or lack of strength. He was hooked at the interval.
Gueye misses Gameweeks 14 and 15, too, and he may be off to the Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) after that. Can David Moyes find a solution, Iroegbunam or otherwise, to adequately fill that void? One possibility is Dewsbury-Hall dropping deeper, so it’ll be interesting to monitor his output if that happens.
He wasn’t adversely affected on Saturday. Moyes brought on Charly Alcaraz (£5.2m) for Iroegbunam at half-time against Newcastle but it didn’t stymie Dewsbury-Hall, who was still more of an ‘8/10’ than a ‘6’.
Dewsbury-Hall, indeed, got forward to score Everton’s second-half goal. That was one of a game-high three shots he had.
At the back, Michael Keane (£4.6m) and James Tarkowski (£5.4m) had the consolation of DefCon/assist points. Defensive contributions and attacking returns are always possible with those two but the bread and butter of clean sheets might be more of a concern with Gueye out, despite the heroics at Old Trafford.
