“Book your trains,” the St James’ Park stadium announcer boomed at full-time. “Book your hotels. We’re going to Wembley!”
You suspect thousands of Geordies had already sorted their travel plans in advance, like in 2023, but this feels different. Whereas reaching a first League Cup final in decades was new, exciting and provoked understandable emotion a couple of years ago, there were no over the top celebrations on Wednesday night.
When the final whistle blew, Eddie Howe and assistant Jason Tindall immediately made a beeline for Mikel Arteta to shake the Arsenal boss’ hand rather than punching the air and patting each other on the back. There were no overcome Newcastle players welling up and dropping to the turf. There was almost a sense of calm rather than deafening delirium inside the stadium at full-time.
“I’ve felt that all season,” Howe told reporters following the Magpies’ semi-final win against Arsenal. “There’s never been a moment where the team have been overly emotional.
“That has positives and negatives. The positive is you’re expected to do your job and be clinical with it. That’s how I want us to be. There have been times this season where we haven’t looked ourselves and have almost looked under emotional. There’s a balance and a sweet spot we need to get right for every game. Certainly it was perfect tonight. It was a really good response to a really emotional game.”
This is what steely Newcastle are now. There was once a time where even reaching a cup semi-final was beyond Newcastle in the Ashley era; now the Magpies have got to two finals in three seasons. That is not something anyone at the club is celebrating, though. The ultimate goal is to make that final leap, to end a crippling 70-year wait to win a major domestic trophy.
This is where the painful experience of 2023 will be instructive. It was a first experience of a final and of playing at Wembley for many of these players. Lessons have been learned from that 2-0 defeat against Manchester United and the sapping build-up. Kieran Trippier referenced the ‘carnage’ of sorting tickets that ‘takes a lot of energy out of you’ but, this time, Newcastle plan to get everything boxed off so the players can eventually focus on the game next month. There has not even been light-hearted talk of getting suits measured.
Captain Bruno Guimaraes has instead spoken about how this group have to win a trophy to truly leave their mark in Newcastle’s history. Jacob Murphy said it was a ‘great feeling’ to reach the showpiece again, but stressed Newcastle ‘owed it’ to themselves to go one better this time. Anthony Gordon has talked of the ‘need’ to get to Wembley regularly.
It feels like a shift in mentality from a side who have become used to playing big games since their last appearance under the arch. Whether Newcastle face Liverpool or Spurs on March 16, the black-and-whites look better placed to give a true account of themselves.
“We learned a lot from that day,” Howe explained. “The whole build-up to the game was long. It was exhausting for me. I’m sure it was the same for the players but, from that, you learn different techniques to help keep your concentration and focus, and not become tired of the long build-up. There are definitely things we as a club can improve and look at to help the players so that when that day comes around, we’re able to perform and give our actual best.”
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