Sean Longstaff

[Ronaldo]

I like him, he definitely has a bit about him and will only get better under Howe. Good news. 

[James]

A Krul or Forster for Darlow swap seems a good idea

[Guest]

Sean Longstaff: I broke down in front of my dad – everything crashed down on me in that moment

by Martin Hardy for The Times

 

The Newcastle United midfielder reveals the depths of a dark period that prompted him to get psychological help — and how he has been reborn under Eddie Howe

 

Sean Longstaff was having an early night in January and had been asleep for a couple of hours when he decided to check his phone. There were four missed calls from Eddie Howe. It was, he admits, a moment of real alarm.

 

“I’ve got a girlfriend,” says Longstaff. “She saw me looking at my phone and I was like ‘Oh no!’ and she was like ‘What?” And I said ‘It’s the manager!’ She hadn’t seen the stuff on the telly about me possibly going to Everton. When you miss a call four times, you’re like ‘What’s going on here?’

 

“If we play on a Saturday, his training sessions on a Tuesday and a Wednesday are really tough, so I got in, had food and pretty much went to sleep, and when I woke up, at about quarter to 11 [at night], my phone was buzzing.

 

“Honestly, I rang him and I said ‘Sorry, Gaffer.’ He just told me what was being said wasn’t true in terms of me going to Everton, and that I’d be staying — he was great. For him to ring me at that time was really important. It made our relationship stronger. He is the first manager I’ve had multiple conversations with on the phone.

 

“He’d been at the club for about a week when he came to me and said he hadn’t realised I was out of contract in the summer and he helped me through that period.

 

“Everything he says I trust. Everything he tells me to do, I’ll do, because I believe it’s going to make me a better footballer.”

 

It was the first week after Howe had taken over at Newcastle United, last November, that the new head coach stood in the canteen at the club’s training ground, with the entire Newcastle first team, and opened his heart to a group of players he had only just met. He told those men his life story, and since, they have told theirs.

 

Longstaff says his relationship with Howe is different from any other manager he has played under.

 

“We have a fine session and at the end of the fine session, a player or a member of the coaching staff has to give a timeline of their life,” Longstaff adds.

 

“The gaffer did the first one, and he goes through his whole life, with pictures, and he talks about his family and he got emotional talking about it. He loved his dog and he spoke about that. I came out of the meeting and I was like ‘Wow, how can you not want to play for someone that’s willing to basically strip themselves bare and we’ve only known each other five or six days.’

 

“Of course, you’re emotional listening to him. I walked out of the meeting and I thought, ‘Whatever he wants me to do, I’ll do it.’ I’m sure everyone else in the team thought that as well.

 

Then you go on to players, and you hear their story. Everyone is from a different place, some grew up in different countries. You get emotional listening to the other lads as well.

 

“Then I did mine and when you’re stood up in front of your whole team and the whole staff, they’re not looking at you as Sean the footballer and what he can do on a football pitch, they’re looking at you as a human, I remember doing a bit about my grandpa and my brother and my family and I got emotional and then the lads see that and it just brings you closer. It connects you on a totally different level and you can see that on a Saturday because everyone is fighting for each other and flying into challenges together and we just don’t want to let each other down. I’m sure that is massive, massive part of how we turned the season around.”

 

There is good reason for Longstaff to get emotional. At the age of eight he was spotted playing for North Shields Juniors and by the age of nine was training at Newcastle’s academy. He made his first team debut under Rafa Benítez at Anfield on Boxing Day in 2018, was lauded by Pep Guardiola when Newcastle beat Manchester City, scored against Blackburn Rovers in the FA Cup and Burnley in the Premier League and was coveted by Manchester United. His star rose quickly but then came a serious knee injury against West Ham United, a fight for fitness and then form and what he now calls a “dark period” followed as praise turned to criticism (He does not speak about Steve Bruce, the former Newcastle manager, but the relationship was poor).

 

Everything reached a head when he went out for breakfast in October 2020 with his dad, David Longstaff, a former ice hockey player who was capped 100 times for Great Britain, and his brother Matty.

 

“It’s weird. I still remember everything about it,” he says. “I remember the table we were sat on. I remember we’d had breakfast in Tynemouth. I could feel myself welling up at the table.

 

“My dad has always been tough on us, in a good way, he still is now, but he looked at me in a different way that day. We went upstairs at mine and he looked at me and kept looking at me and he didn’t really say anything and then he wasn’t looking at me like a dad who was going to talk about football, or take the piss, he was looking at me like a dad who wanted to know what was wrong.

 

“When he did that, I was like — woosh — I remember breaking down in front of him, bursting into tears. I was in a pretty bad way. My dad can be an intimidating bloke but he just grabbed me and squeezed me and said how proud he was of me. It was the first time I had got emotional in front of my old man. It was just a culmination of everything crashing down on me in that moment.

 

“What made me feel down? You go from wanting to play every week to not really playing, when you come in, instead of playing, you feel you have to set the world alight. It’s a difficult time. The team wasn’t in a great place. Everything around the club was negative. You get caught up in that if you’re the one coming through meant to try and help everything. You become one of the targets, I would say.

 

“Me being from Newcastle growing up and going to watch, you would see things written or said about you and it used to kill me inside. Everyone used to think I was great, and now this.

 

“I remember when it was spiralling, in the middle of it you think, it’s not too bad, it’s not too bad, but it changes you as a person. I look back and it was a pretty bad period to be around me. For my family, the people closest to me, they are who you take it out on. You can’t go and argue with every single person who says something horrible about you. That’s not how it works.

 

“About a day later, I got a text from Matt Ritchie and a telephone number of a psychologist. ‘Do this. You need to speak to him.’ ”

 

So he did.

 

“I felt a little nervous calling him. You think, ‘What’s he going to think?’ and you’re opening yourself up to someone you’ve never met and you feel vulnerable, but then you wonder why you didn’t do it earlier.

 

“I always say, if someone says they don’t think Lionel Messi isn’t very good at football or they don’t think LeBron James is good at basketball, or they don’t think [highly of the American football quarterback] Tom Brady — and he’s the big one for me — then of course they’re going to have something bad to say about Sean Longstaff!.”

 

“It’s about small building blocks,” he says. “He’d talk about little things before training sessions. He’d say, see if you can get a couple of compliments today. Something as little as that.

 

You’d come off and it would happen and you’d be like ‘Aah, I achieved my goals for today’ and if you do that over a prolonged period of time then eventually you’re going to have to force someone’s arm and they will have to give you a chance.

 

“Everyday I still do it. I set myself little targets, and the little targets will create something much bigger.”

 

By the time of that phone call from Howe, he was back in Newcastle’s team. In his 12 appearances from the turn of the year, Newcastle won eight times and drew once. At the end of May, Longstaff, now 24, signed a new contract to stay at the club he supported as a boy for at least three years.

 

“I felt good and I felt relief. Who knows where the club could be in three years’ time? It shows they will give me time to progress. I’m in such a better place now. I look for the positives in everything and that is a massive thing. To have the backing of the manager is such a good thing and I don’t have to worry about if I am here or not next season. Did I celebrate? I went round to my nanna and grandpa’s house and we had a family barbecue.

 

“We want to build on last season, when we finished 12th, like what I was told, build slowly, and for me I want to play as much as I can. I’m not a kid anymore. I’ve been through a lot in the last four years. I want to be playing every week. I want to kick on and be one of the main players in the team this season.”

[Guest]

?? good interview by Martin Hardy with Longstaff, hope the lad kicks on this season

[gbandit]

Great piece that, really endearing 

[McCormick]

Howe is such a gem, man. Rated him before but he’s so much better than I thought. 

[Guest HTT II]

That’s quite a sweet read, shows Howe in an even better light and shows the pressure on footballers, they themselves put on them, managers, fans, the media etc. whatever we think of them, especially those playing for their hometown team. 

[80]

Good on Matt Richie for doing Bruce's job for him, too.

[nufc123]

Lets Play!

[HaydnNUFC]

Good read, that. Always thought he would've been one of those in the squad who hated Bruce, given how poor he was under him. Hopefully this season he can be much better than the last 3 and play his best football.

[Kanj]

Started welling up reading some of that, the fact he's a local boy and the negative press he was getting (and stuff he probably reads online, even though he shouldnt!) was really getting to him. Good reminder he's a human being, a local kid who absolutely adores NUFC and some of hte shite said about him is pure trash. Kick on Sean! 

[Tiresias]

Absolute state of cabbagehead. Local lad coming through, expected to be a star, starts playing poorly and gets abuse. What does fucking cabbagehead do? Clearly absolutely nothing. No doubt thinks he was soft. Relied upon Ritchie to do his job. Wish Ritchie had punched Bruce out completely. 

 

I mean it's so mad. Arm round shoulder (and Bruce is apparently meant to be an arm round the shoulder style manager lololol) and he maybe could have regained form. But no. And even from a pure business sense, Longstaff was being linked to £50m moves away, if we'd sold him last window would we have got even £20m? Just absolute madness how Bruce's absense of coaching was tolerated for so long.

 

Good on the lad, would absolutely love for him to come on strong again and shine next to the Brazilians. 

[Guest HTT II]

36 minutes ago, Kanji said:

Started welling up reading some of that, the fact he's a local boy and the negative press he was getting (and stuff he probably reads online, even though he shouldnt!) was really getting to him. Good reminder he's a human being, a local kid who absolutely adores NUFC and some of hte shite said about him is pure trash. Kick on Sean! 

Aye it makes me feel bad for being critical of him on here, I must learn because my own son is a footballer and the pressure they put themselves under is unreal, even as kids. 

[Ste]

When you start to connect the dots, you can see why Ritchie called Bunce a coward. 

[Yorkie]

Love Sean Hate Steve

[Guest HTT II]

If Ritchie is that type of person, I’d keep him around, he could have easily not given a fuck and the club would do well to bring in welfare people to help those suffering be it because they are out of form, injured or just youngsters trying to make it in the senior team. I know the academy has such people, but they are 3rd party and part of the foundation and not always accessible.

[Kanj]

7 minutes ago, HTT II said:

Aye it makes me feel bad for being critical of him on here, I must learn because my own son is a footballer and the pressure they put themselves under is unreal, even as kids. 

 

I think we're all going to naturally kick off about players not doing the business for our club, and we'll continue to do that. I know after reading that, I'm going to try and watch what I say about our own players (esp the local ones who grew up with this club in their blood) on the internet. I wouldn't want that said about my own kid either mate! 

 

I really really hope Sean and Joe Willock become important players for us this season. 

[toon25]

1 hour ago, McCormick said:

Howe is such a gem, man. Rated him before but he’s so much better than I thought. 

That piece right there is exactly why the transfer policy of getting decent characters through the door is so important.

 

Fucking phenomenal work by Howe to generate such togetherness given the shitshow he took on.

[Holloway]

Got some heavy criticism on here in that poor spell,sadly it's going to happen if you can't put a foot right time after time. The manager though, it's becoming evident he's pretty special

[Kanj]

Just now, HTT II said:

If Ritchie is that type of person, I’d keep him around, he could have easily not given a fuck and the club would do well to bring in welfare people to help those suffering be it because they are out of form, injured or just youngsters trying to make it in the senior team. I know the academy has such people, but they are 3rd party and part of the foundation and not always accessible.

 

Mate, i think that is why Howe really wants to keep him around (along with Lascelles, Fede and Dummett), they really seem to be the old heads around the club and look after the youngins and the new guys. I'm all for it mate. Eddie knows what he's doing and I back him! 

[Guest]

Guess it depends how determined these guys are to play regularly because I can imagine opportunities will be limited moving forward. Could see Ritchie being the “reserve team guy” who’s around to mentor the youth that are coming through. 

[Guest HTT II]

Just now, Kanji said:

 

I think we're all going to naturally kick off about players not doing the business for our club, and we'll continue to do that. I know after reading that, I'm going to try and watch what I say about our own players (esp the local ones who grew up with this club in their blood) on the internet. I wouldn't want that said about my own kid either mate! 

 

I really really hope Sean and Joe Willock become important players for us this season. 

Aye I think the Ashley years turned me super cynical, ultra critical and really hateful when in reality he’s a Geordie lad and trying to live his dream, reading that article I thought how would I react if that was my boy going through it and like you I got a tad emotional.
 

He’s 8 and was recently let go by sunderland (lucky escape ha ha) and it upset me greatly and I tried to handle it by saying to him they have to give other kids a chance and it was always just training and he was so mature about it, but was upset because he made so many friends there and asked if he would ever see them again. Thankfully he has and will no doubt see them again and again going forward.
 

They had a tournament the other day which they won, but lost one game and they were beating themselves up and it’s weird because the coaches are the best ever and don’t go crazy and us parents are so supportive. I’ve told my boy unless they are paying you to score goals, if you don’t, don’t worry for example. I’m going to be less critical of our players from now on, it does help mind knowing they are all working their bollocks off for the cause and I can appreciate that.
 

We don’t demand a team that wins, but a team that tries. That should be applied to our players. Ritchie has went right up in my estimation. Future coach/management material. Keep him around, fuck it if he doesn’t play. He’s one player even under the shite of Ashley who never gave up or threw in the towel and always seemed to care. 

[Dr Jinx]

I remember last season as well, Joelinton had one of his first motm performances and was being interviewed alongside Longstaff and he totally stood up for him, saying every player loves being on his side in training because that means they win!

 

I thought he’d somewhat checked out while Bruce was there but didn’t realise it had affected him mentally so much. Great article and really puts that 2 years in perspective.

 

Also shows how Matt Ritchie was/is one of the leaders in that dressing room, especially before Tripps and Burn have come in.

[Guest HTT II]

7 minutes ago, Kanji said:

 

Mate, i think that is why Howe really wants to keep him around (along with Lascelles, Fede and Dummett), they really seem to be the old heads around the club and look after the youngins and the new guys. I'm all for it mate. Eddie knows what he's doing and I back him! 

I don’t rate Dummet, as a footballer anyway, and did question given him a new contract as he’s always injury prone but I legit know 3-4 of our academy coaches and a few scouts and they say he’s great around the club with staff and watches the youngsters, comes in and takes part, does some training with them and is good pals with all those coaches who were in the academy with him, but unlike him, didn’t make it. No-one has a bad word to say about him. I’m just loving that we have a United club on and off the pitch now, on the club side and on the stands.

[Kanj]

Top posts @HTT IIand @Dr Jinx 

 

Consider me shook a bit reading that article and hopefully others will do the same re: our players. We don't need to overly slag these lads off, even on off days, there is no doubt in my mind Howe and the coaching staff will be doing what's needed to right those wrongs and mistakes. We're all United!