Assumptions can be inaccurate, unfair and sometimes downright dangerous. Eddie Howe and Newcastle have had their fair share of often lazy theories – about the manager’s future and the limits of the club’s potential – but they travel to the Emirates Stadium on Sunday having trampled all over assorted hypotheses.
Should Newcastle win, Arsenal will have been beaten an unprecedented four times by one team in a single season and St James’ Park executives should feel sufficiently confident to start sprucing the stadium up for Champions League combat in early autumn.
In many ways Newcastle’s Carabao Cup semi-final triumph over Mikel Arteta’s team (aggregate score 4-0) and the 1-0 Premier League victory at St James’ Park last November are emblematic of their recent transformation into members of the top tier’s elite. It is a step up that, despite the Saudi Arabian cash injection in October 2021, few pundits expected to happen so quickly – and certainly not with Howe continuing at the helm.
When, in November 2021, the then Bournemouth manager was offered a job rejected by first Rafael Benítez and Unai Emery, the Saudis’ third choice was widely regarded as a stopgap. All very well for averting relegation but in need of upgrading once Newcastle began challenging for Europe.
Even after Howe first achieved Champions League qualification two years ago while leading Newcastle to the 2023 League Cup final, a certain sniffiness endured. Early this season Manchester United’s then sporting director, Dan Ashworth, suggested to Sir Jim Ratcliffe that Howe might be a suitable successor to Erik ten Hag but United’s co-owner reportedly poured scorn on the notion, making it plain he want a coach with “more charisma”.
Since then Newcastle have overcome Liverpool to lift the Carabao Cup, their first domestic silverware in 70 years, and could pip Arsenal to a second-place league finish.
Few now doubt that a 47-year-old once described as “the fella that got Bournemouth relegated” by his St James’ Park predecessor, Steve Bruce, is an elite coach. Let alone underestimate a Newcastle side that, in order to comply with Premier League spending rules, have not signed a first-team ready player during the past three transfer windows.
After watching his Arsenal players left bewildered by Howe’s switch to a back three and deployment of Fabian Schär as Declan Rice’s man-marker in the second leg of the League Cup semi-final, Arteta must wish that last autumn’s chatter about José Mourinho becoming close to Newcastle’s chair, Yasir al-Rumayyan, had resulted in a change of the managerial guard on Tyneside.
Howe knew better than to react to those stories. Yet on Friday he did betray rare “frustration” with the idea that Arsenal will cherry pick Newcastle’s Alexander Isak and Anthony Gordon this summer.
“It’s a source of frustration because I don’t see why our players are getting linked, here, there and everywhere with other clubs,” said Howe. “I’d like to think the players are happy here. I’d like to think again that they’re seeing us grow and develop into a team that hopefully can compete at the top end of the division.
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“Our ability financially to compete during the last few years has been hampered by profit and sustainability rules, but those issues aren’t there for the coming transfer window. So I don’t see any reason why we can’t strengthen, not weaken, ourselves.”
Newcastle managers past – with Benítez the notable exception – have complained that top players, and particularly their wives and partners, simply do not want to live in the north-east. Howe, though, believes such impressions about the region are outdated.
“I’ve not sensed that problem here,” he said. “I think the biggest issue with players is that they want to come to a club they believe is moving forward and has a chance to win trophies. Of course, financial terms are an issue so there are challenges. But the north-east is a brilliant place to live and I’ve never had any issues over that with new signings.”
After spending most of his life in southern England, Howe arrived with an open mind. “I came in here without any knowledge of the north-east,” he said. “I’d never spent any time in the area but I’ve been pleasantly surprised. My family love it and I enjoy being here as well. There’s been no issues with it.”
He also debunked ideas that the Saudis might be losing interest in disrupting the Premier League’s pecking order. “We’ve got a lot of areas to grow in,” countered Howe. “I still feel we’re just starting. There’s a totally different feel about this place to when I came in yet we still have more to deliver to be at the very elite level; we’re in the very early stages of that. But the owners’ ambition to improve is really aggressive. Things will change pretty quickly in the next few years. There’s no doubting the ambition.”
