Eddie Howe’s glittering run at Newcastle United has now run into a Black Cat — or 11 — and he’s under serious fire.
MORE — Newcastle v Sunderland recap, video highlights
The Magpies have dropped all six points to their newly-promoted rivals after throwing away an early lead at home to Sunderland in Sunday’s Tyne-Wear derby.
Regis Le Bris again outfoxed his counterpart with halftime adjustments and Newcastle are below their rivals on the Premier League table.
And there was a pause in the match for an allegation of racism toward a player.
What did Howe say about his latest loss in the derby?
Eddie Howe reaction — Newcastle boss speaks after another Tyne-Wear derby setback
What to make of loss? “Painful, tough afternoon for us. Positive start. When we scored we wanted to go and dominate the game. We never really capitalized on that momentum. The first half fizzed out. Second half we were second best. Too many giveaways. Too many times we gave momentum back to Sunderland. Defeat’s harsh on us.”
“We have to really look at ourselves and make sure we learn from all the mistakes we made. It’s happened to us before. This isn’t a one-off. Yes there have been mitigating
“It was so delicately poised. Sven hits the post. Malick’s goal is chalked off. These are big momentum swingers for us. We wanted the second goal. We needed to defend our goal better than we did in the two moments we conceded.”
How do you respond to this? “We’ve got some massive games to come. We get a chance to go into a different phase of our season. Week-to-week we can train and maybe get that freshness back into our performance. We’re going into this on a negative so we’ll need a lot of character to respond.”
Still hope to reach Europe? “We’ll never give up on anything. We’ll always go for what we can. I want to see more domination of the ball and better chances. We have a lot to reflect on.”
On a pause in the game for alleged racism: “We don’t condone any racism and it’s something the club will investigate.”
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