Newcastle United manager Eddie Howe has warned his players that they must take responsibility of their European aspirations if they want to have a thrilling Premier League season finale.
Spurs came from behind to relegate Burnley, but Chelsea and Manchester United are close behind. The 1-1 draw with Brighton at St. James’ Park on Saturday effectively ended Newcastle’s prospects of catching up to fifth-placed Tottenham.
Wednesday night finds Howe’s squad making the journey to Old Trafford in preparation for a last-ditch effort against Brentford, and the manager is optimistic that they will be able to secure a victory.
“Indeed, it is within our control,” Howe stated. We have a significant disparity in our aims. Since you can only influence the variables within your control, it seems to reason that you would rather not consider alternative outcomes.
Even so, you are very careful not to overlook anything. These two games will be very challenging, and we are prepared.
Howe is hoping that Newcastle can continue their winning streak and secure a spot in Europe for a second consecutive season. United have only won once in the league against Newcastle since 1972, but the Magpies have won all three of their previous meetings.
This is something we aim to do regularly, he stated. You can see the other teams vying for those spots, which makes it so much harder to do, as trivial as that sounds.
You can see that we’re making every effort, as we have all season long, to attempt to achieve those goals. The season has been long and challenging, and we’ve faced difficult conditions.
On a hot afternoon on Tyneside, Joel Veltman gave the away team the lead in the 18th minute following a pass from Pascal Gross and an assist from Danny Welbeck.
However, in the last seconds of the first half, Sean Longstaff equalized, making the current Magpies squad the first in 65 years to score in every home game of a Premier League season.
Just five minutes before the end of the game, Anthony Gordon celebrated what seemed like a victory, but an offside flag cut his joy short.
After the first half, Howe thought his team may get the momentum they needed to win the game, but that didn’t materialize.
Its inverse After celebrating his team’s success, Roberto De Zerbi—who just announced that Danny Welbeck is nearing a contract extension—challenged his players to finish in the top ten in their upcoming home matches against Chelsea and Manchester United.
The performance was excellent, according to De Zerbi. We faced one of the top teams in terms of physical condition right now, and the outcome of the game was completely up in the air.
“Our goal is to finish in the top ten, and we have two more challenging games coming up at home.
“It’s not a huge result, but when you think about how many injuries we’ve had and the fact that this is our first season playing in the Europa League, I think finishing in the top 10 would be an amazing result, even better than last season.”
