If not for the FA Cup, those connected to Newcastle United would be forgiven for wanting the season to finish tomorrow.

It is a shame, for the neutral at least, that the Amazon cameras weren’t capturing this campaign – calves, hamstrings, warts and all.

At least once a month, it seems, Eddie Howe is forced to appear for his weekly press conference wearing a crash helmet as well as his club tracksuit.

First, there was the Sandro Tonali affair, his £52million marquee signing banned for 10 months for illegal gambling. He then had his club captain, Jamaal Lascelles, caught in a 4am street brawl in which a gang threatened to shoot him.

January saw his chief executive, Darren Eales, advertise that the club needed to sell players, and so the dressing-room was unsettled by approaches for Kieran Trippier, Callum Wilson and Miguel Almiron. None of them went and, to Howe’s frustration, no new signings arrived.

Bournemouth targeted Newcastle left back Dan Burn, who should now be given a rest

Bournemouth targeted Newcastle left back Dan Burn, who should now be given a rest

Eddie Howe has been forced to wear a crash helmet to interviews with his issues stacking up

Eddie Howe has been forced to wear a crash helmet to interviews with his issues stacking up

Friday gone was the Dan Ashworth saga and the likely defection of Newcastle’s sporting director to Manchester United. Howe’s performance in answering those questions was far better than his team would manage 24 hours later. Calm, clever and cutting, he said the club would be just fine without Ashworth and, if he was going, make it quick.

Then there are injuries, always injuries. The insult has been the freak nature of several – broken backs, dislocated shoulders and torn chest muscles. Howe’s players have been tagging each other in and out of the treatment room, and rarely has the list of absentees dipped below double figures.

To the backdrop of it all is the resistance of their rivals, fearful of the emergence of a Saudi-backed super club. Howe declared last month, ’We have no friends’. It is hardly helpful when one of those you thought was a pal, Ashworth, then wants to join the enemy.

Turbulence off the field, and turbulence on it. Saturday was an X-rated re-run of the defensive flaws that, until addressed, render progress impossible. It’s one step forward, one to the side and one back right now. In truth, they are going round in circles, stuck on a leaky spin and conceding goals like never before. The 41 shipped this season is already eight more than during the entirety of last.

Bournemouth should have won here. They targeted left-back Dan Burn and profited when Antoine Semenyo scored the goal to put them 2-1 up in the second half. Burn was immediately substituted and the time has arrived for him to be given a rest, for the good of himself and the team.

Bournemouth should have won at St James' Park after Antoine Semenyo gave them the lead

Bournemouth should have won at St James’ Park after Antoine Semenyo gave them the lead

A mistake by goalkeeper Martin Dubravka gifted Dominic Solanke the first goal, and the loss of Nick Pope, more than any other, has hit Newcastle hardest. Twenty-six of those goals conceded have come in the 12 matches without the injured keeper.

It said much that Newcastle’s two best players weren’t really meant to feature this season – Lewis Miley, 17, and Matt Ritchie, 34. The older man salvaged a point in injury-time with his first goal in nearly four years.

Supporters started the game by singing Howe’s name and finished the afternoon with the same chorus. They are fully behind the head coach, but many are perhaps looking forward to the day when this season is also behind them, and the team they recognise can re-emerge.

There is, though, the FA Cup, and a winnable trip to Blackburn for a place in the last eight. While there is that, hope remains that a season to forget could yet be a season to remember.

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Post source: Daily mail

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