Key events
17 min: Stats. “Blocks”?
3 – Newcastle are only the sixth side in Premier League history to score three goals within the opening 9 minutes of a Premier League match, and first since Man City vs Burnley in April 2010. Blocks. pic.twitter.com/WmnuiO58Ac
— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe) April 23, 2023
15 min: Tom Stratford gets in touch: “The Tottenham emergency alarm seems to have gone off earlier than 3pm? Sob…Incidentally isn’t that going to make a hell of a racket at 3pm when every phone goes off simultaneously?”
Reminds me, I watched the film Threads the other week.
13 min: First Spurs attack, Kane misses from a fine pass from Skipp. The jeers are loud and ripe. As they are when Lloris clanks the ball out of play from a backpass.
12 min: In days gone by, this would have been the signal for a club to place all of its players on the transfer list. Newcastle, by the way, have been great but have played better and not scored so easily.
10 min: Ryan Mason and Cristian Stellini on the touchline, two condemned men, try to make sense of what’s happened. The answer: lads, it’s Tottenham, and Tottenham at their most vulnerable and chaotic, a clown car of a club.
Goal! Newcastle 3-0 Tottenham (Murphy, 9)
Dier plays the ball out, Schar presses and Murphy smashes the ball, Lloris doesn’t move and Murphy’s face shows the incredulity we all feel.
7 min: This has been ugly for Tottenham, x-rated stuff. Howay 5-0 cannot be long in coming. So many questions but why did Spurs allow Conte to buy players who are only suited to one type of play?
Goal! Newcastle 2-0 Tottenham (Joelinton, 6)
Oh my, oh wow. A long ball skates through and Joelinton rounds Romero and Lloris, too easy, and scores. Tottenham are an absolute rabble.
4 min: Romero is trying to marshal the Tottenham defence with some good old-fashioned chestbeating and fist clenching. They might need more than that.
3 min: Porro has struggled enough as a wing-back in defensive terms so to ask him to play full-back is brave, novel, foolhardly, you name it. Joelinton tore into him with glee.
Goal! Newcastle 1-0 Tottenham (Murphy, 2)
….the early news is not good….Joelinton strides on, Porro doesn’t get close, the shot is unleashed and the ball falls to Murphy who slots with ease….
1 min: And away we go at SJP, Olivier Skipp doing the honours. And yes, it’s a back four for Spurs. Let’s see how Porro and Perisic get on with Newcastle’s power….
Here’s Chris Paraskevas: “G’Day John, 11 pm kick off here. My mate and I have avoided speaking about this game all week, after we watched the Villa game together. I fear a Harry Kane double inside 15 minutes. Beyond the ingrained pessimsm… if you can’t win these types of games: you don’t deserve to play in the Champions League and shouldn’t bother.”
The teams enter the field to Carmina Burana, then the Premier League anthem, now Mark Knopfler’s Local Hero. A thorn between two roses there.
Joe Pearson emails in: “Good morning, John! As a Liverpool fan, I’m rooting for an exciting, high-score draw, so both teams drop points. On another topic, how was your Record Store Day? What limited release items were you able to snag?”
Answer: none, I went to Fulham v Leeds for the Observer. I have only done RSD once, back in 2018, and never listened to the records I bought for £150. There was a Fall 1977 recording i fancied this year, but only as a collector, but I will leave the Glenn Medeiros pineapple-coloured vinyl to the real heads. Might have a dig at the remaining stock this week some time.
By the way, Sting’s in the stadium. This was his offering for this year’s RSD. (Sheesh.)
Complementing the recent RSD double single package of Message In A Bottle, a brand new exclusive edition for RSD 2023, Every Breath You Take packaged in bespoke 2 x 7” special double pack gatefold sleeve.
Features original UK single and a bonus disc featuring the extremely rare track – ‘Every Bomb You Make’ – an exclusive version, with new lyrics, re-recorded specially for the 1980s satirical TV programme “Spitting Image”.
The set also includes the rare instrumental (‘backing track’) version of Every Breath You Take.
Inside the gatefold are two colour-printed inner bags featuring the original A&M label’s ‘company’ sleeve design.
Pressed on limited edition heavyweight red & yellow coloured vinyl.
Remastered and cut at Abbey Road Studios, London.
Tracks:
Disc one – original UK 7” single (red vinyl)
Side A – Every Breath You Take
Side B – Murder By NumbersDisc two – bonus disc (yellow vinyl)
Side A – Every Bomb You Make
Side B – Every Breath You Take (Instrumental)
Cristian Stellini talked to Sky Sports about that new formation. The word is Spurs last didn’t play three/five at the back in January 2022.
It’s a formation we used in the past, it’s not a big change. We used it sometime, we have to be ready to play an important match. You think the players we use are for 4-3-3 but it is only your opinion. This is a big part of out thinking, we need to be ready to fight. We want to try to do our best. No, it’s not the last chance, it’s an important match, we have three games in a week, it’s an important week.
Eddie Howe has had a friendly fireside chat with the Sky team, including an offer from Danny Rose to be his third-choice left-back.
It’s a huge game for us. No denying that at this stage of the season with the games running out. We’re playing one of our competitors in the league so it’s a big moment in our season. We’re pleased to be at home and we hope we can feel the force of the crowd this week.
It’s what we crave as professionals. You want the big games, you want the big occasions and you want it to mean something. We’re determined to express ourselves in the best way possible. We want the occasion to galvanise us, we don’t want to play with any fear or restraints and we want to give the best us.
We have risen to these types of games this season. Hopefully we can find another gear again.
Let’s not forget that Tottenham need a new manager. Jonathan Wilson wishes them good luck.
But identifying that up-and-coming manager is difficult – and given recent appointments and signings, it is not clear there is anybody at Tottenham with the requisite vision. It’s easier, always, to go for proven quality, to assume that success at a previous club will necessarily be replicated at Spurs, when the cases of Mourinho and Conte show that not to be true.
It’s been a big week for Tottenham.
Less than 24 hours later, the club were blindsided by Fifa’s decision to extend Paratici’s 30-month ban from Italian football for alleged false accounting to the rest of the world. The club knew a global punishment for Paratici relating to issues from his Juventus days was a possibility, that it was maybe in the post. It was just not meant to be delivered that day.
Just one Toon change, and that’s Shaun Longstaff coming in for Anthony Gordon, despite that heavy defeat to Aston Villa.
It looks as if Cristian Stellini has abandoned the defensive shape that Antonio Conte so rigidly stuck to, and that means Eric Dier will partner Cristian Romero in central defence, while Pedro Porro, the player they said can’t play anything other than wing-back, will play full-back. Similar goes for Ivan Perisic. Clement Lenglet drops to the bench, with Pape Sarr starting.
The teams are in
Newcastle: Pope, Trippier, Botman, Schar, Burn, Longstaff, Joelinton, Murphy, Willock, Guimaraes, Isak. Subs: Dubravka, Lascelles, Gordon, Wilson, Ritchie, Targett, Manquillo, Almiron, Anderson
Tottenham: Lloris, Porro, Romero, Dier, Perisic, Skipp, Hojbjerg, Sarr, Kulusevski, Son, Kane. Subs: Forster, Sanchez, Richarlison, Danjuma, Tanganga, Davies, Lenglet, Devine, Mundle
Preamble
When Newcastle won at Tottenham in October, it became clear their challenge for the top four would be a serious one. It was also apparent that Tottenham’s title challenge would never, ever materialise. And it has come to pass, with Antonio Conte a casualty along the way. Newcastle can take a huge step to returning to the Champions League for the first time in 20 years while Tottenham might find life easier from what has become a less than comfortable home. Last week saw both teams beaten, Aston Villa, the stalking horse, smashing Newcastle 3-0, before Bournemouth stole a last-gasp, but deserved win at the Tottenham Stadium. Villa’s draw with Brentford ease Tottenham’s worries over dropping to fifth but visiting St James is daunting. Tottenham have not won a league match outside of London since beating Bournemouth 3-2 on 29 October.
