On the One Hand...

Newcastle don't look like a Champions League candidate. On the other hand, neither do most other teams as well.

D'oh - Newcastle snatch defeat from jaws of victory

Newcastle dropped a second straight home match against an upper mid-table side.  Fulham are not a bad team but the 1-2 loss says a lot.  This is not the formula for a top four finish.  The Mapgies were not awful. They did have 1-0 lead for much of the match.  But, there were plenty of holes in their game.  The two biggest for me is how easily they get dispossessed and sloppiness in passing -either directly to the opponent or soft enough that it's easily intercepted.  The stats across the board were fairly even - possession 47/53, shots 11/15, shots on target 4/4 and xG 1.02/1.60.  Okay, they do shade Fulham's way, especially the xG.  They weren't unlucky, just not good enough.

No Sun Farther South Either

Aston Villa were in fact more disappointing than Newcastle in a 2-0 loss to Wolves.  More possession and more shots did not help the Villans.  Actually a pretty dismal affair for the NBC feature match.  As we will discuss below under Turning Over the Inventory, the Aston Villa line up may be in for a significant shakeup.

Reports of Nottingham Forest's Death Are Greatly Exaggerated

Chris Wood on the way to a hat trick
Photo:Getty

Or at least premature.  They pounded Brighton 7-0, in stark contrast to get mauled by Bournemouth last week.  The xG of 3.50 - .94 seems really light to me; this felt every bit of a 7-0 blowout.  They had a two goal lead by 25 minutes.  Then Chris Wood put up a natural hat trick with goals at 32, 64 and 69; he's tied with Isak for third best in the EPL at 17 goals (no bonus points for knowing that Salah and Haaland are 1-2).  Two late goals just served to put on exclamation point on the win.  Even with Chelsea's 2-1 win over West Ham on Monday, Forest sit in third with a four point cushion.  Arsenal crushing Man City 5-1 helped on that front as well.  

Streaks Ending

Bournemouth's 11 game unbeaten streak came to a close with an 0-2 loss to Liverpool.  Southampton got their first win in 13 matches, a streak running back to a 1-0 win over Everton on November 2. And Spurs got their first win in seven matches with a 2-0 result at Brentford.   We note that xG was 1.93-.89 favor the Bees so this might have been a touch lucky; given that xG says Spurs have been exceedingly unlucky this season, maybe it is starting to even out.

Turning Over the Inventory

By my count, Aston Villa were the most active player in the January transfer window.  I count 21 loan or transfer deals - six in and fifteen out.  And this wasn't just rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic.  Big names out include Diego Carlos, Jhon Duran and Emi Buendia.  Notable incoming players are Donyell Malen (F), Marco Asensio (F), Andres Garcia (RB), Axel Disasi (CB) and Marcus Rashford (cue dramatics).  Garcia and Disasi might start on Sunday in the FA Cup match against Spurs and expect Rashford to make an appearance.

Newcastle, in stark contrast, made eight moves, every one of them a transfer or loan out.  This is not necessarily a bad thing.  I would rather them find out what they have versus making risky signings in a chase for a Champions League berth.  Not that they really have financial room to do that right now anyway.

Conversation That Could Have Taken Place and Sort of Did

Dennis:  I heard that Arsenal will not celebrate Easter this year?

Steve: Yes, because Jesus will not be returning.

Now We Really Carabao It

Bouncing back nicely from Saturday's defeat against Fulham, Newcastle completely stymied Arsenal in the second leg of the Carabao Cup semi-final and walked away with a 4-0 aggregate win.  Jacoby Murphy and Anthony Gordon got the goals in the second leg and the three man back line (Schar, Botman and Burn) was well-organized.  The Murphy goal (seen here as this week's YouTubeableMoment and again here from the Toon Army perspective) at 19 minutes was key to putting this tie to bed.  At 3-0, the Gunners had an incredibly difficult road back into the match.

Spur were less successful holding their first leg 1-0 lead.  Though they held Liverpool at bay for over half an hour, once the dam was broken, the goals poured in.  The 4-0 final looked about right.  Tottenham didn't manage a shot on target.  

So Liverpool and Newcastle will meet on Sunday March 16 at Wembley.  Yes it's the least prestigious of the competitions but it's a chance for Newcastle to earn some hardware.

We Don't Have Jack

Hard to be happy that McGlynn is leaving, even if
it was a lot of money

In a move that might seem surprising but really isn't, the Union sold midfielder Jack McGlynn to the Houston Dynamo.  After all the highlights he's provided over the last several years, most are sorry to see him go.  Normally, you would think clubs would like to hang on to talented 21 year-olds but this isn't quite as nuts as it sounds.  First, for over a year now, they have been actively shopping McGlynn to European clubs but never found the right deal.  The Houston offer was $2.1 million up front with up to $1.3 million more depending on performance bonuses.  They were highly unlikely to get anything like this from a European club.  Second, his two shortcomings - lack of speed and limited defensive skills - stand out more in the system that the Union play.  Fair enough.  But selling popular players is risky business and all eyes will be on management to see how the money is spent.  As usual, we can count on Jonathan Tannenwald to give us the facts and in-depth analysis, which can be found here.

 

Another FA Cup Weekend

This extended weekend sees the 16 fourth round matches for the FA Cup.  Newcastle will travel to England's Second City to face Birmingham Saturday at 12:45; that must be considered some kind of feature match because it's the only fixture in that time slot.  Most interesting match up for me is Tottenham-Aston Villa at 12:35 on Sunday.  Both sides are coming off of disappointing performances.  One wonders if Postecoglou survives a loss here; that would mean Spurs had been bounced from two cups in four days.

Nice of the schedulers to give us some weekday action.  Friday at 3 we have Man United - Leicester.  Monday we can watch Crystal Palace - Doncaster (the lowest ranked side still in the competition).  There's even a Tuesday fixture with Exeter City hosting Nottingham Forest.  Thanks guys.

Except...your better choice on Tuesday is Man City - Real Madrid in the first leg of their playoff tie to advance to the Champions League Round of 16.  A shock that these two didn't make the top eight and now one of them is going home early.  There are seven other Champions League matches spread over Tuesday and Wednesday.  Add in Europa League playoff fixtures on Thursday and there's a complete viewing week for you. 

After the day off on Tuesday, we'll have 12 straight days of football.  Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.