New season, same problems for Newcastle - so why did Steve Bruce decide to stay at club?
August is supposed to be a time of optimism in football, but after two league defeats Newcastle’s reality is already biting faster than most
ByLuke Edwards24 August 2021 • 1:28pm
Steve Bruce's side have lost their opening two Premier League games
Few clubs do an early season stumble with a greater sense of impending doom than Newcastle United - and after just two games Steve Bruce already needs a win to disperse the storm clouds gathering on the horizon.
Newcastle face Burnley in the Carabao Cup on Wednesday before another home game against Southampton on Saturday. It is not overly dramatic to say they must win at least one of them to keep everyone united.
August is supposed to be a time of optimism in football. When everything remains possible, dreams are allowed to soar and hope is unrestrained.
Even more so this season, with supporters back inside stadiums, old matchday routines resumed and friendships rekindled, rarely has going to the match felt so refreshing; so exciting; so joyous.
But after two defeats to West Ham and Aston Villa, Newcastle’s reality is biting faster than most. We have not even reached September and Newcastle are teetering on the edge of something ugly; something angry and mutinous.
Bruce was not a popular manager when he won five out of the last eight games last season to power clear of the relegation threat that had become so severe in March that he was steeling himself for the sack and supporters were preparing themselves for a third relegation in the space of 12 years.
It has not taken long for the old complaints and resentments to resurface, at least on social media. As the former Newcastle manager Graeme Souness once opined - you are never more than two defeats away from being under pressure in the dugout at St James’ Park.
Newcastle fans are still turning up in vast numbers, home and away. But they are also weary, drained by the never ending false hope of a Saudi Arabian takeover, their emotions manipulated and toyed with, now resigned to another season under owner Mike Ashley that they have seen play out so many times before, but also unimpressed by what they have seen at the start of Bruce’s third season as manager.
Whatever progress there has been since he arrived in 2019, has been minimal. He has collected the exact same number of points in two years as his predecessor Rafael Benitez, despite more than £100m of investment in players, yet the squad remains a limited one, mainly because £40m of that was wasted on Joelinton.
Joelinton cost £40m but has not been a regular goalscorer CREDIT: GETTY IMAGES
Have a good season and this Newcastle side could finish anywhere between 8th and 10th, have an average one and it will be anywhere from 11th to 17th. Have a bad one and they will end up in the Championship again.
Despite the satisfaction and back slapping that accompanied the £22m capture of Joe Willock from Arsenal, he was already a Newcastle player, on loan, at the end of last season. The squad playing now is the same one that played from the end of January, minus a backup striker in Andy Carroll.
The squad desperately needed to be improved and overhauled this summer if real progress was going to be made, but that has not happened.
Bruce has warned the best that could occur between now and the close of the window is one more player arriving on loan. Possibly Leicester City midfielder Hamza Choudhury, if the East Midlands club are willing to let him go.
Given the lack of money at his disposal, even that seems unlikely, which is why Axel Tuanzebe ended up at Aston Villa when the Manchester United centre-back’s preference was a move to the North East. Newcastle couldn’t afford the loan fee to make it happen.
So why have Newcastle opted to stay with the same squad that ended last season and why has Bruce decided to stick around when he knows he will be the man in the firing line if results do not improve?
Newcastle only spend what they have
While other clubs can borrow money from a bank, or have an owner who can pump money in, Ashley does not allow either to happen.
The money paid for Willock was a surprise, which may mean that rule has been broken, although it is more likely Arsenal were willing to accept payment in instalments.
Even so, the only reason Newcastle signed the England Under-21 international was because Bruce pushed all summer for it to happen. He was initially told it could only go through if it was a loan, but his persistence paid off.
The sale of Florian Lejeune to Alaves and a windfall from the £15m deal that took Newcastle’s former academy striker Adam Armstrong from Blackburn to Southampton, owing to a sell-on clause, effectively funded the Willock deal, topping up the initial budget of around £10m Bruce was told he had in May.
There may be more money to spend in January when the next television money is paid to Premier League clubs, but there is very little left this summer.
Bruce has not been able to sell anyone once again
Newcastle have sold one player in the two years Bruce has been in charge - Lejeune for a nominal fee.
There are plenty of players Newcastle would be willing to trade to raise funds, but there have not been any bidders. Goalkeepers Karl Darlow and Freddie Woodman, midfielders Matt Ritchie, Sean Longstaff and Isaac Hayden are all open to the idea of a fresh start, having been at the club since they were in the Championship in 2016.
Striker Dwight Gayle is another on the fringes who, in a normal summer, would certainly have had interest from Championship clubs given how prolific he has been throughout his career in that division, but the crushing impact on the pandemic ended that idea.
Dwight Gayle is on the fringes at Newcastle CREDIT: GETTY IMAGES
“Most people have to trade, but I’ve been unable to do that,” said Bruce ahead of the Burnley game. “We haven’t been able to sell. Nobody wants to sell their best players, but we all would like to be in a position to trade. That’s normal. But we haven’t been in the situation to do that.
“I’m not talking about selling your best players, but if you can trade then you can alter your squad. We haven’t been able to do that because the Championship is on its knees, so there’s no movement there, and really the only league you can sell to at the moment is the Premier League.
“There’s not much happening in Spain, not much happening in France and there’s very little money in Italy. We’ve not been able to trade the way I would have liked to. I would certainly have listened to a few offers, but they haven’t been forthcoming.”
So why has Bruce stuck around when he demanded to be backed at the end of last season?
The signing of Willock has placated him. He was his No 1 target and the club, in the end, made it happen. He appreciated that and the effort it took to persuade Ashley to sanction the deal.
Bruce intends to build the team around the exciting young midfielder but he is not fully fit after a disrupted pre-season. He is also young and therefore inconsistent. A repeat of his eight goals in 14 games on loan is unlikely.
In an ideal world, Bruce wanted another midfield player, centre-back and a striker, but he recognised this was far from an ideal world. Managing Newcastle under Ashley rarely is, but the pandemic has complicated things across the football world.
So, having weighed everything up, Bruce decided to stay on and fight the same battle he has been wrestling with for the last two years - winning over sceptical supporters who are not impressed by the way he speaks to them, his record before he got the job or results and performances since.
While the outside world feels Bruce has done a decent job in difficult circumstances, people are far less forgiving within the fanbase. Rightly or wrongly, that is simply pointing out the reality of things on Tyneside.
Bruce knows the quality of his squad better than anyone, he knows the problems injuries to players like Allan Saint-Maximin, Callum Wilson and Willock will cause, but he refused to walk out. He is stubborn and strong willed, if a little overly sensitive to criticism at times.
In Bruce’s mind, Newcastle need him to keep them out of relegation trouble once more in the hope that Ashley can finally find a buyer and the club can end 14 years of purgatory.
He will hope for more than just another relegation scrap, but it looks like being another difficult season for all concerned, even at this early stage of the campaign.
