Aston Villa come off of a hugely positive week as they take on Newcastle in the North. With Emery in the stands Villa will be keen to impress again. It will not be easy though as Newcastle havenβt lost in seven games.
I spoke to @LoadedMagNUFCβs Rich Storey (@RichyStorey) to find out more about Newcastleβs season so far.
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Bruno Guimaraes has been excellent since joining Newcastle and heβs been a joy to watch. Many fans know how good he is but are there any players who donβt get as much credit?
Where to start! NUFC fans are a very knowledgeable bunch & I believe they’d agree with me that the whole playing squad should be getting more credit. Mainstream media praise Bruno (which is thoroughly deserved) but it’s also the lazy narrative. The whole squad has raised their game by working hard for the shirt & putting the team needs before their own.
But that ethos leads to personal improvement too. Miguel Almiron is up there to be the most improved player so far this season. He’s on fire at the minute having scored 5 goals in his last 5 games. Fans always felt that if he was able to find an end product, we’d have a very good player on our hands. Joelinton too deserves a big mention too having been transformed but also helped Bruno settle in to the North East very quickly.
Since the takeover, Newcastle have been absolutely flying sitting in the Champions League places. Whatβs changed since the takeover?
EVERYTHING!!! We were a club that we’re pretty much a rudderless ship for the previous 14 years under Mike Ashley. The new owners have brought football people into the club in the important roles on & off the pitch. But the arrival of Eddie Howe as Head Coach has a touch of genius. There was lots of media pundits & fans saying it wasn’t a good appointment as his last job ended with Bournemouth being relegated back to the Championship. But there was a lot of mitigating circumstances that went against him in the last half of that season which the majority of managers would struggle with.
As a channel, we did a special show called The Howe Handover to discuss how good a coach Eddie Howe is. We were joined by Tom Jordan (@TomJordan21) from Back of the Nest (@afcbpodcast) who helped NUFC fans understand the details Eddie Howe would go into to move the club forward. We saw it straight away. He leaves no stone unturned in making his players better.The whole squad is fitter this season which enables the team to play the style of football he wants us to play. Better players were always going to be on the agenda when the windows arrived, but NUFC fans knew it would be done sensibly. They’ve improved the quality of the squad, but you also have to look at the fantastic work done with the players he inherited.
Joelinton was wrote off but is now one of the best midfielders in the Premier League, Fabian Schar is now playing like the international CB that we saw in glimpses under Rafa Benitez & as I mentioned earlier, Miguel Almiron has been a revelation this season but I’m sure one of your ex-players in Jack Grealish may have helped Our Miggy determined to prove him wrong!!!
Wor Flags has also had a huge impact, helping set the scene & atmosphere on a matchday with their amazing fan funded displays with nods to the area as well as both current & ex-players. For the first time in a long time, we’re all in it together. WE’RE UNITED!!!
Newcastle has the third highest xG in the league which is being converted into goals. How exciting is Eddie Howeβs football?
It’s some of the most exciting football that NUFC fans will have seen at St James Park. I’m lucky enough to have grown up with The Entertainers in my teens then the Sir Bobby Robson era in the early 00s but there’s a whole new generation of NUFC fans experiencing this for the 1st time!
We’ve gone from a defensive, low block team trying to win games on the counter by relying on a few players to hopefully nick us a goal to a team that plays fast, front footed football with plenty of energy that gets lots of players into the box when on the ball to a high intensity defensive unit without the ball who constantly press the opposition in & around their own box to create a team that currently leads turnover stats in the Premier League.
The personnel brought in to help implement that has been huge too. We’ve seen a few flashes of how good Isak will be in the future, we all know the difference Bruno has made too but the attacking football starts at the back too. Nick Pope was a snip from Burnley who was known to be a fantastic Premier League experienced GK, but his distribution allows the attack to be started quickly.
Kieran Trippier loves to build attacks down the right-hand side but our CB partnership of Fabian Schar & the Rolls Royce that is Sven Botman is pivotal too. Both are ball playing who like to play progressive, line splitting balls but also have the intelligence & capability to spread the direction of play due to their ability to spray the ball over the entire pitch.
What is also exciting about Eddie Howe’s style to is how good defensively we are too. NUFC have never seen us this good defensively. We see pictures of the back 5 celebrating clean sheets but make it clear that it’s a team effort & starts with the press that the forward players implement to a very high standard.
Finally, whatβs your score prediction?
St James Park is a fortress again! We’ve only lost 1 game this calendar year at home & that was against Liverpool towards the end of last season. We gave Man City a scare after going toe to toe with them & our home form would look even better if it wasn’t for some dubious refereeing & VAR decisions last month.
However, October has seen us put teams to the sword but also grind out some fantastic results away from home. No doubt Villa will be bouyed by the win last Saturday against Brentford but we’re a much tougher task. All NUFC fans will tell you we’re higher than we’d expected to be but we’re on a very good run which I see continuing on Saturday with 2-0 win against Villa.
@RichyStorey
OPPOSITION FOCUS | BRUNO GUIMARAES
Since Newcastleβs takeover in October 2021, they have used the transfer window to significantly improve their squad. Nick Pope, Alexander Isak, Dan Burn, Matt Targett, and Kieran Trippier have all had an impact on this growing side. Newcastle’s most interesting acquisition, however, is their Brazilian midfielder, Bruno Guimaraes.
Iβll be taking a look at Guimaraesβ career so far and assessing the effect he has had on Newcastle.
Guimaraes started his career in his native Brazil where he worked his way through the ranks before joining the first team. In May 2017, a young Guimaraes made the jump into first division football as he joined the then Brazilian Serie A side Athletico Paranaense on loan. Before his loan spell had chance to expire, the club outright bought Guimaraes.
After three seasons with Paranaense, Bruno decided to apply his trade in Europe with Ligue 1 side Lyon. The Brazilian joined on a four-and-a-half-year contract and fetched a hefty β¬20 million and a 20% sell on clause. His first season proved difficult as he made just three appearances. However, the next season, Brunoβs fortunes changed.
In Guimaraes first and only full season in Lyon colours, he made 33 appearances finding the back of the net three times. Heβs aggressive style of play and impressive work rate made him a fan favourite in Lyon. In the half season he played afterwards, he made 20 appearances and earned himself a transfer to England.
Almost 2 years to the day after joining Lyon, Bruno swapped Lyon for the black and white of Newcastle. This was the start of the love affair between Bruno and Newcastle fans. Perhaps the reason why Newcastle fans love Bruno so much is epitomised by the first goal he scored for the club. A cheeky back heel volley on his debut helping Newcastle along to a 2-1 win over Southampton. That type of flair is what Newcastle fans adore so much.
However, itβs not just the flair that Newcastle fans admire. Guimaraes loves to get stuck in and win the ball for his team. Itβs this willingness to get stuck in and raise the intensity which makes Bruno so crucial for Newcastle.
MY PREDICTION
Again, this is a tough one to predict. Itβs clear that Newcastle have been the better team this season. Having said that Villa is on a real high with the appointment of Emery and the 4-0 last weekend. Newcastleβs seven game unbeaten run shows how hard they are to beat BUT nothing is impossible. Iβm going to go against all logic and be blinded by optimism and predict a 2-0 win. Bailey and Ramsey on the scoresheet.
AUTHOR | ELLIS BURNETT
Author’s UTV PODCAST archive ellisburnett – UTV Podcast | An Aston Villa Blog
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