Howe on Newcastle snatching late draw against Liverpool
04/12/2024
St James' Park, Newcastle, UK
04/12/2024
St James' Park, Newcastle, UK
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SportsTranscript
00:00Where do you start with that one? A fascinating, entertaining game of football, do you feel you should have won it?
00:11Mixed. Mixed emotions. Part of me feels we should have won it, a big part of me.
00:19And part of me is of course pleased we didn't lose either because it was such a late goal for us.
00:24But just genuinely very pleased with the performance, much more attacking output, much better feel about the team,
00:31really good energy, really good quality performance against, for me, the best team we've played so far this season in the Premier League.
00:38So a big jump forward I think for us.
00:41Did they have the sort of look of champions the way they came back into that game?
00:45I don't know, I think it's a difficult thing for me to focus on, I'm only focused on us.
00:50Certainly their substitutions gave us a problem with Trent's attacking quality and potency with the ball,
00:57certainly gave us an issue down that side of the pitch.
01:01Disappointed with the goals we conceded, but I don't think that should overtake my general feeling and emotion,
01:08which is that's much more like us and if we can hit those levels consistently we're going to win a lot of games.
01:13Two pretentious decisions from an e-commerce perspective.
01:16A trip on, what looked like a trip on, and Klondike's attack inside the box,
01:19and then the referee ended the game when he did.
01:22What are your thoughts on that, please?
01:24I thought it was a penalty on Alex, but I haven't seen a replay, that was just an initial thought.
01:30I was surprised by the final whistle because I think we spent around about two minutes on a free-kick in extra time,
01:35so I was expecting seven minutes to be played.
01:39I think it's 5.15 when he's blown, so that was a blow because we looked like we were in a good position.
01:45Thanks, Luke. Damien and then George.
01:48Obviously Mo Salah was very good today, he's finishing,
01:51but when Alex is in that kind of form, is he as good as anyone around?
01:56Yeah, I think it was Alex's best performance of the season for us today.
02:01First of all, let's take his goal, it was a goal out of nothing really for us,
02:04and I think this season we've missed those.
02:06I think last season he scored regularly goals that were probably not expected to score,
02:11and those moments of magic can swing games your way,
02:14and I think that was a massive step towards doing that tonight.
02:17But then he was elusive to Mark, he was difficult to pick up, he was popping up all over the place.
02:23Dribbling with the ball, he's a great dribbler, so it was great to see those qualities back in his game,
02:27I just thought it was a top performance from him.
02:29For most of us, it was a certain vintage,
02:32so as a reminder of the 4-3 smack in the mirror, did it for you?
02:36Well, I was hoping it would be one of those moments,
02:38and that was going through my mind late in the game when we equalised.
02:41I'm thinking we might get one more chance here,
02:44and I thought the counter-attack was that chance, but obviously it wasn't meant to be.
02:48Thanks, Damien. We'll go to George and then Leroy.
02:50From the start, it felt like a team with a lot of grit,
02:53is there any frustration on your behalf that it's come from the performance
02:58that we saw at the Palace, that consistency is just so elusive?
03:05Yes, and that's very much in my head, because tonight we're everything that we want to be.
03:11We weren't perfect, but we're everything we want to be in terms of attitude,
03:14body language, demeanour, energy, pressing, attitude.
03:18I have to say, I don't think Palace was as bad as maybe the perception is of that game,
03:26because we were 1-0 up with seconds left,
03:28and if we win that game I think there's a totally different view on it.
03:31But I understand that perception always changes with results.
03:35West Ham's last half an hour I thought was the low point for me.
03:40But, yes, we need to hit the type of standards we did today consistently,
03:44and that is the challenge now for the players to deliver.
03:47As a manager, I guess you want to know what to expect from your team,
03:52because it feels like this season you've not been able to...
03:57Yes, I think that's a fair assessment, and I have made that clear to the players.
04:03But we have to find a solution together, me included, coaching staff.
04:07We always move forward together, whatever the outcome,
04:10and we're always trying to find solutions,
04:12because there's always issues and problems you have to solve.
04:15We want to be the best team that we're capable of being.
04:17I think we're on our way towards that.
04:19From the start of the season to now we've improved steadily.
04:22I hope that improvement continues as we go into a key month.
04:28Thanks, George. Lee Ryder then, Craig Hall.
04:32Is a 4-1-0 win not tempting at all?
04:36Give our discussion before the game.
04:39Yeah, it's ended 3-0, but there would be no difference in the preparation for me
04:45and the players in terms of what we want to deliver on a regular basis.
04:49I wasn't standing there saying,
04:51the lads know we want to create and score goals,
04:55and we know we want to play with a fast dynamic intensity,
04:59but sometimes the game, for whatever reason, just doesn't deliver that.
05:02Crystal Palace would probably be one of those games
05:04where we didn't get our flow going,
05:06but we were winning the game with the last seconds of the game.
05:09But I was pleased to see that dynamic in our game.
05:12We need to create and score,
05:14and I thought our attacking players all delivered a really good performance today.
05:17Our midfield was really strong against a really dynamic midfield that they possess.
05:21I thought we lived with them, so a big credit to our midfield.
05:24I also thought, bizarrely, although we conceded three goals in the main,
05:27we defended pretty strongly, especially in the first half.
05:29I thought it was a really good defensive performance.
05:31Obviously we had issues in the second half that we'll have to reflect on.
05:35On that P7 strike, it was 70 miles an hour,
05:39can you still stand back and avoid those effects?
05:42Yeah, as I said earlier, it's great to have one of those moments from Alex,
05:45because those moments of quality he does possess,
05:50and he's done consistently for us.
05:52Maybe not so much this season, those clinical goal-mile strikes from distance,
05:57but he's more than capable of doing that,
05:59and that's why he can make the difference for us.
06:01Excellent. Craig?
06:03You touched on it briefly, but the midfield three,
06:05five games ago you went away from that three as a combination,
06:09you've gone back to it today, why did you go back to it,
06:12and was that Hiddleston's big plan to play together,
06:14given all of the debate around them as a trio?
06:17You love the midfield three debate, don't you?
06:20LAUGHTER
06:21And I understand it, because it's an interesting thing,
06:25because you've got three outstanding players.
06:27For me, with our midfield, we've got six outstanding midfield players
06:30to pick from, and getting the balance right of those six is very difficult,
06:34because they all have different skills.
06:38I've gone back to it because I think it can work,
06:42the three of them together, I think we've obviously changed the dynamic
06:45of how it lines up, and there's strengths and weaknesses to that,
06:49we're seeing Bruno in a different position,
06:51I thought he played well today,
06:52Sandro I think has been excellent the last two games as a six,
06:55real competition for places,
06:57but three outstanding players that we need to get the best out of.
07:01OK, a few to finish off, we'll go to Dominic, Jordan and then from Rob.
07:05Within two minutes tonight you'd had two shots on goal,
07:08the intensity was there, did we see a team with a point to prove
07:12maybe to the fans, to themselves tonight?
07:15Yeah, I always think we have points to prove,
07:17regardless of what we've done previously,
07:19and maybe that's one of our issues,
07:22you win a game, nothing changes, we've got to win again,
07:25you lose a game, nothing changes, you've got to fight back,
07:28so I never get lost in that sea of results,
07:32I get lost in the sea of performance and making sure we try to be at our best,
07:37and that won't change now moving forward to Brentford,
07:39it wasn't lost on me that we had two shots early in the game
07:41and I was delighted with that start because we needed that after our last game.
07:45Anthony Gordon, back on the left,
07:47his first goal in four months like this season,
07:49did you see the best of him tonight?
07:51Yeah, I think we did in key moments,
07:53I thought he really delivered.
07:55I thought he was electric.
07:57If I'm an opposition manager looking at that performance,
08:01he's one of the first port of calls I've got to try and deal with,
08:05and I think that's Anthony at his best.
08:07Very, very pleased with his goal, could have had more.
08:11I thought he kept going right to the end as well.
08:13Just quickly, can you check in on the sports name?
08:16Just an illness problem.
08:19Jordan.
08:20Just on the referee, there was one in the first half,
08:22Anthony Gordon went for a shot,
08:24then went to ground under a challenge by Virgil van Dijk,
08:26looked like he took a shoulder to the face,
08:28were you surprised VAR didn't look at that?
08:30Well, I think VAR did look at it and concluded nothing happened,
08:34so I have to accept that.
08:36Were you surprised by that?
08:37I was, yeah, initially.
08:40Eddie, you mentioned that wonderful control you had in the first half,
08:43then it became a bit more end-to-end in the second,
08:46could you explain if you wanted it to become a bit more open,
08:49or what was happening in the second half?
08:51Absolutely didn't want it to be end-to-end,
08:53when you're winning the game you want control.
08:55We had that control in the first half,
08:57but I think you have to understand Liverpool's dynamic,
09:01there's two teams here, and I think their substitutes did well for them.
09:06I think Trent's an obvious attacking threat,
09:09with his crossing and his passing,
09:11probably more his passing than his crossing,
09:13although he's created one of the goals,
09:15he's breaking our lines with his outstanding range that he possesses,
09:18and we didn't deal with that individual threat well enough,
09:21although we had prepared for it, but stopping it is another thing.
09:26Thank you, everyone.
09:27Cheers.