Newcastle United boss Eddie Howe was able to enjoy the luxury of sparing some of his stars for the Carabao Cup quarter-finals against Brentford as his side swept into an unassailable lead at St James’ Park.
At 4-0 up with Leicester City fearing a scoreline that could have got out of hand, Howe took off stars like Tino Livramento, Bruno Guimaraes, Jacob Murphy, Anthony Gordon and Alexander Isak. There will be no messing around in the Carabao Cup against Brentford with Howe ready to attack the competition and go pretty much full strength.
In the space of just 90 minutes against the Foxes, Newcastle have clawed their season back out of the fire and after a raucous ovation at the end of the Leicester game the picture could look even brighter on Wednesday night. After the rout against Ruud van Nistelrooy’s side, Bruno was excited about the prospect of what lies ahead.
He said: “We need to step up in all games and not just against the big six. Against Leicester it was big proof that this team can do big things together I think we stepped up in this game. It was a massive win. The team played well, especially in the second half.”
Bruno’s goal for the Magpies was his first since the last day of last season as he ended a six month drought. The Brazil star reacted: “I am very happy to score again. I have been trying for a long, long time, but I wasn’t lucky. But very happy for today and we need to keep going. We have a massive game on Wednesday.”
Gary Lineker’s Match of the Day let off
The long-serving BBC Match of the Day host Lineker quipped that he was delighted that close pal Alan Shearer was absent during the post-game analysis on Saturday night. After absorbing the 4-0 loss for his beloved Foxes, Lineker joked: “All I can say is thank heavens Alan Shearer is not here. He’s not been happy with his team lately but he was on Saturday! I know because he was texting my all afternoon gloating like he does but he’s right, they were very good.”
The Magpies have famous memories of beating Leicester 7-1 in 1993 under Kevin Keegan but this was actually the biggest top-flight victory over the Foxes since 1909.
Congratulations to Sean Longstaff
The Newcastle midfielder could only have dreamed of spending a lengthy career when he broke into the reserves a decade ago as a young hopeful. But despite only being on the bench, it was a momentous occasion for Longstaff as he made his way on to the field.
Longstaff has now clocked up 200 appearances for the Magpies and he took to social media after the game to say: “Proud to have played my 200th game in black and white. Some result to go with it too.”
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