Any Newcastle United fan will tell you the recent blip in form is typical of the Toon Army. While the magnitude of throwing away their lead at the top of the Championship pales in comparison to the 12-point one they held over Manchester United in the Premier League back in 1995/96, the memories are bound to linger over St. James’ Park.
With Brighton having secured promotion to the proverbial Promised Land yesterday, Chris Hughton’s Seagulls side are all but certain to win the league, too. Obviously, the Magpies still have a chance of lifting the trophy, though the seven-point gap those on the south coast hold would take some overcoming between now and the end of the campaign.
Still, there will be no emotional meltdown from Rafa Benitez. Outsiders will point to the fact Newcastle not only boast a Champions League winning manager – one who was appointed Real Madrid boss as recently as 2015 – and a hugely expensive team as reasons why they should have walked the league title. Perhaps that’s true, though it doesn’t quite tell the whole story behind between Benitez’s revolution in black and white.
Newcastle have been a mess for years. As an ardent follower of the Toon Army, the main sources of excitement to have radiated out of Tyneside in recent years have come from the final day of the 2014/15 campaign when John Carver just managed to retain Premier League status, as well as the arrival of Benitez in March 2016.
It’s been that bad.
After stagnating under Alan Pardew ever since the fifth-placed finish at the end of 2011/12 season, rot began to set in. Poor recruitment and a distant owner, the Magpies failed to capitalise on the momentum of that campaign as Newcastle’s most exciting team in years was pulled apart by bad management and player sales.
While Steve McClaren was barely the most popular choice to take charge of the club in the summer of 2015, there was little the former England manager could do. A limited coach, perhaps, but even a manager with a CV as impressive as Benitez’s is showing just how deeply set the problems at the club are.
The manner in which Newcastle bounced back from the relegation of 2008/09, as well as the way in which they may do this time around lends itself to the adage that going down is the best thing for a club in those situations. Certainly, there is something to be said for that, though the impact of relegation shouldn’t be understated. It’s terrible.
In many ways, skipper Jamaal Lascelles sums up this current incarnation of a black and white side. A hugely popular figure amongst the support, a captain finally prepared to take responsibility of his team, though a player who can still see his solid runs of form outdone by nerves and silly mistakes.
Nerves have proved a sewing motif throughout this season. The pressure the players feel when playing at St. James’ Park when things aren’t going their way has been well documented, though Steven Taylor’s comments prior to the loss at Ipswich suggest that sort of anxiety has now crept into Newcastle’s away games this season. At the worst time in which to do so.
“I’ve spoken to a couple of their players, I’m not going to mention who, but they’re a bit nervous because they’ve seen that we’ve picked up a few draws against big sides, and are making a good go of it.”
When reading that before the game, that looks like a standard pre-match comment from an opposition player. Still, after, it would at least suggest Newcastle’s players are feeling the pressure – even away from home.
Instilling confidence in a club that has been on its knees, one who sold their best players during the summer after a ridiculously meek relegation is a mammoth task. While many supporters will claim the exits of the universally unpopular Moussa Sissoko, the inconsistent Georginio Wijnaldum and the hot-headed Daryl Janmaat are much to cry about, there’s little doubt these are good players and wholesale changes take time to set in.
So, Benitez isn’t just changing a squad of players. He’s changing a club to have lost a great connection with the city it stands so proudly in the middle of, a losing mentality to have engulfed the various players to have donned the famous strip in recent years and a feeling of inherent distrust amongst sections of support to owner Mike Ashley.
This is a process. A long one. Other than the passionate support of their long-suffering fans, Newcastle have been a loveless club for years. It’s taken the arrival of Benitez to change that, though the damage to have been done requires yet more TLC. Having been neglected for so long, that sort of attention is almost an alien concept to many of the players to have stagnated with the club, one that needs some getting used to.
From the outside looking in, just how hard the Toon Army have made it this season looks like a failure. However, other than the period in which Kevin Keegan’s pulsating side of the mid-1990s captured the hearts of a nation, Newcastle have never been a club those from the outside understand.
Promotion is paramount this season. Lamenting the fact a team as expensively assembeled as this one, in the Championship, are hoping Huddersfield Town and Reading go through a blip in order to keep them at arm’s length will do little to help now.
Newcastle won’t win the league, though still have their desinty in their hands. That’s easy to forget. The ‘Rafalution’ is still coming people, just in typical Newcastle United fashion.
