Gottlob

He gets into some nice positions to receive the ball, but tonight was the best I've seen from him in terms of his ball carrying and in that regard he really helped to drive the team on in the first half, two big plusses for a player I've been regarding as too passive.

I feel like this Champions League format minimises the risk for the bigger sides, but that still felt like a really exciting game and one we can be proud of especially after a bad start and with a referee who was out to get us. Willock had a really good game, Ramsey managed an impressive ninety minutes, Gordon and Barnes maintained our threat late into the match and the defence looked solid after the iffy start. It wasn't particularly fluid, but I think you could also see how we might get more out of Woltemade and perhaps also the side playing with narrower wingers and a couple of ball carriers.

We gotta break their bones to make our bread!

We looked suicidally bad for the first 15 or 20 minutes. I don't know whether it was Willock and Elanga pressing too aggressively, the full-backs being dragged out of position or just the pace at which PSG started the game, but we could barely muster two players in the midfield. But we've really grown into it. We look much more compact defensively and are making a real go of it on the break. I think all of the attackers improved during the course of the half: Elanga and Willock are roaming and interchanging nicely, and with Ramsey we seem to have some capable ball carriers, while Woltemade too has started to battle and hold onto the ball a little better. On another note I think if I was a member of the Newcastle staff you'd be able to strain the referee through muslin by now. I'm always especially amazed that the VAR screens make it through games like these.

We spent a lot of money last summer, none of those players are write-offs with Wissa and Ramsey having slower starts than we would have liked owing to injury, and if we decide that we do need major surgery up front or down the wings then it will require some serious thought and probably an attempt to recoup some money in the summer to come. So I didn't expect us to make any major moves this transfer window, but given the injuries at the back, Trippier's age and some niggles in the midfield I really don't see why one addition - a backup left-back or maybe even an experienced holding midfielder - is beyond us. The league is a shitshow this year and we're right in the mix, so I don't think a bit of help would go amiss.

He's apparently a big Kate Bush fan, so I think it's just that he has nothing to motivate himself with when he has to run the other way.

Palace got another year and a half from Guehi, won the FA Cup and are still selling him for up to £30 million with a sell-on clause. I doubt they regret not selling him to us and we bid for him when he was always going to be at the height of his value. Gabriel Gudmundsson at Leeds is the type of profile we should be looking for at left-back and maybe even right-back in my opinion: an experienced option in their mid-twenties from a decent club outside the Premier League, who wouldn't cost the earth and in our case would probably be content as a backup/rotation option.

As others have pointed out Woltemade doesn't have loads of top-flight games under his belt and I think he absolutely can learn to be a bit more aggressive and take first-time shots when through on goal. I think he can really become whatever he wants to be and is hugely talented, though I also think we have benefitted from the return of Wissa who isn't firing on all cylinders but allows us to be more dynamic and direct. And to that end I think Howe will give Woltemade time and try to coach him but I'm not sure we're going to do much to really integrate him into our play. Earlier in the season there were occasions where we looked to be trying for some slick interplay through the middle or for one of the midfielders to play in a more advanced role, but I think we've reverted to type and will tweak the system rather than really making strides to become more of a possession team.

I'd love to have Bruno, Tonali, Miley and Anderson as the basis of our midfield for the next four or five years and then add a couple of specialists. As much as Tonali has been off form and the midfield continues to struggle or play an ancillary role, I still feel that when one of him or Bruno are absent we are likely to lack a bit of personality in the midfield, and risk becoming more ragged or passive. Anderson would solve that problem but he's probably out of our price range at the moment and we have in Ramsey another stolid midfielder rather than a specialist who at least seems to be finding his form.

And to think they used to let this Semenyo compete against women over 800 metres.

Your age and relationship to the game at various points in your life will obviously have a huge impact here. I was just about to turn six when Keegan arrived at Newcastle, saw my first ever game during a pre-season friendly that summer and then started attending St James' regularly with my father and grandfather during our promotion season. He and the players were heroes to me then in a way they cannot and probably should not be now. While I admire and am hugely fond of Howe and some of the players that feeling is compromised by my sense of the world and their place in it, by the hierarchical and money-dominated nature of today's sport, by our ownership and so much more. For me Keegan had not only by far the biggest impact in terms of reviving the fortunes of the club but also produced our best sides and gave us our most exciting players. We might not have always been the free-scoring side that 'The Entertainers' monicker suggests but I also feel that Keegan gave us our most fluid and cohesive elevens: under Robson there was a wonderful balance to our front six with the pace and directness of Bellamy, Robert and Dyer complementing Shearer, Speed and Solano's experience and guile, but I thought our defenders were pretty woeful, while at times under Howe we have struggled in terms of fluidity and control on the ball. Keegan was also our most charismatic manager. Perhaps his sense of righteousness was kind of overweening or he was sometimes too quick to take offence, but his passion and openness and ability to wear his heart on his sleeve is still a model for me though Howe in a more complicated period always speaks well and is really pitch-perfect with the press. I still regard 1995-96 as our pinnacle in all my years of watching the club. Robson was wonderful overall but I personally soured on him during his last year or so when I felt like he started playing favourites and kind of dismantled a really promising squad. For me Robson and Howe would be pretty much level in terms of a ranking but Howe has plenty more to give and obviously the League Cup win already provides a strong reason for giving him the edge. Perhaps controversially I don't think Benitez was a top manager by the time he arrived at the club and I thought he did a good rather than great job even considering the difficult circumstances. For me he has always been overly conservative and questionable in the transfer market and while he gave us back a level of respect, I think in terms of getting the most out of the squad you could even argue that Bruce fared better in the 2018-19 season when we ended up in a similar position despite having nothing up front. For that reason I ultimately think of Benitez like I think of Hughton: dignified managers who did well but were always going to struggle to amount to much. The rest were substandard to diabolical, with the latter sometimes more fun. Time has softened my view on Dalglish and Gullit but I still loathe Allardyce and Bruce.

Thought he was excellent today. Not only strong but made some good runs and was pretty nifty in possession. He was involved in Wissa's early chance and he took his own offside goal brilliantly.

At least he got into the position. Not sure that Ramsey offers more upside or variety to our play.

I know this is a snide thing to post after another great performance from Miley, but even though I hope he becomes a world class midfielder I think his performances at right back show some of Livramento's limitations. Miley makes smarter movements as well as being better on the ball.

Thought we were pretty good in the first half - we started out playing very direct football through the midfield and created chances, while they only really threatened through Hughes at the end of the half - then got better in the second and kept at it even after going ahead. It was a bit like pinball at times but we did well and Wissa, while sometimes a bit clumsy, obviously allows us to play in another way.

Great control and finish by Joelinton. We're being very direct and creating opportunities but I'm not sure the game needs to be so open.

It was nice play from Tonali, Joelinton and Gordon for the Wissa chance.

I detest Trump and Infantino and would love to boycott the World Cup and feel as though my decision was going to be somehow validated. But the corruption of the Trump administration is so encompassing - even as it is based upon past models and depends upon other people's deference or support - that the World Cup itself much less my own response to it feels somewhere between a sideshow and totally irrelevant. It's also true that most of us will have watched past World Cups which were more corrupt at the bidding stage, whose construction entailed human rights abuses or which even proved corrupt out on the pitch. In comparison next year's World Cup might even be relatively clean or tame beyond the inevitable sycophancy. I doubt that a single player will boycott next year's World Cup, and the sport in general feels quite rotten at the moment with a low baseline of integrity. We as Newcastle fans are implicated because beyond the ongoing human rights issues in Saudi Arabia, our owners are also some of the biggest backers of the Trumps. They gave Trump and Kushner billions after leaving office, and while we quarrel about player purchases or plans for the stadium and training ground they squander their money on halfwitted projects or else throw in with Trump and his supporters to buy EA or bid for Warner Bros. In sum it is not impossible but it feels quite difficult and conflicted to be a Newcastle fan while proselytising about the World Cup. Therefore I'll probably do what I do right now when it comes to most football: have it on in the background because it's a lifelong habit and offers some kind of solace while being bitter and bileful about the whole thing.

He's ours Toulouse!

We used four subs today and that picture should have been of fifteen sheepish grins glancing back over an equal pair of very sore bottoms.

That guy's tweet helps to draw out our reliance on a fairly flat midfield, which is probably the first thing I'd change about our side given that more shape would surely help us to add more control centrally. I'd gladly swap out two from Joelinton, Ramsey and Willock for a more dedicated holding player and a creative midfielder, but Howe obviously likes his setup and the support it provides and we have been very successful with it. I think that setup by design doesn't really allow us to control games with the ball and makes the midfield ancillary to the rest of the team, but the other side is that we've tended to get great numbers from our wide players. Now of course in Woltemade we don't have a striker who leads the line or keeps up with the attack in the same way. We're not pressing as high, and the combined result is that the wingers are dropping deeper. We are still a fairly direct side but we don't carry the same threat on the transition. I don't think Howe will fundamentally change our approach and a formation switch seems to invite problems with the makeup of our squad. If we play Woltemade and Wissa together for instance, we surely require more depth up front while it would marginalise either the wide players or some of our midfielders. I don't see Ramsey as a number ten nor do I like the idea of him, Joelinton or Willock playing as part of a midfield two. The last two summer transfer windows have been a mess and there's a growing sense of stasis or even muddiness around our off-the-field operations and long-term plans. I wonder if the players buy into the idea that we're a side who really struggles with two games a week. Overall it feels like we're in a bit of a rut but that can change quickly, and my guess is that we'll keep plugging away and tweaking the relationships between players rather than turning to anything more drastic.

Thought Miley was positive with his play from right-back and Wissa showed the difference a proper striker might make.

His position shouldn't be in question and we're still at that stage of the season where a few wins will push us right up the league. But there are some issues which stretch back several years. The shape of the midfield isn't right, and while we've long since relinquished our headlong press we now don't have the attack to excel in transition but our possession play if anything seems to get worse and worse.

I think the midfield is a major problem but for me it's about shape and coaching as much as the personnel. We've managed to get great numbers out of some not-so-great wide players by pressing effectively and being quick on the transition. The midfield's job and I presume the idea behind the flat three has been to aid in that press and set the forwards away without spending too much time on the ball. Now the situation up front is different and it requires something different of everyone. One of the basic fixes in my opinion would be to install a proper holding player at the base of the midfield. It would give a bit of shape to our buildup and make us less easy to play through/leave less holes in the centre of the pitch.

Looked off the pace and unsuited to today's game from the very outset. You can't sit deep and look to counter with Woltemade as the striker because he doesn't have the pace and our wide players aren't good enough to go it alone. If you can push a bit higher up and are still looking to play on the transition, you need Woltemade and the midfielders to link up with some slick interplay before they play in the wingers. We haven't developed sufficiently in that direction and besides most of our wide players aren't clinical in front of goal. The other options are we become more of a possession-based side or find some sort of room for Wissa.