When this new Premier League season begun back in August many would have expected few teams to still remain unbeaten going into October’s fixtures. Champions Manchester United? Probably. Massive spending Manchester City? Almost certainly. Newcastle United after losing various key players? Ye…..hang on a minute! Don’t you mean now perennial title challengers Chelsea? Nope. Or how about big spending and revitalised Liverpool? Certainly not. Finely balanced and attacking Spurs? No no no! Strange as it may seem, as the first league fixtures of October ended, there are four Premier League teams who are still yet to taste defeat this season in the league; first placed Manchester United, second placed Manchester City, fourth placed Newcastle United and seventh placed Aston Villa.
Undefeated and flying under the radar of some of the supposed ‘bigger’ clubs in the Premier League Newcastle United are enjoying a fine start to this season. Even the most ardent supporters would have struggled to believe they would be unbeaten after 7 league games, after the extremely turbulent summer they witnessed. To be honest, many must have feared the worst.
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Newcastle were still reeling from the loss of local lad Andy Carroll as the summer began, but with the transfer window now open again, here was a proper chance to use the huge sum of money they received for their former striker and replace him. Instead, talk was of an exodus of more key players, due to broken promises and contract issues. Captain Kevin Nolan was first high profile name to leave. What must have confused (and maybe embarrassed) fans of the Toon Army was the fact that he left to join a side in the Championship! Next to leave and following in Carroll’s footsteps was the much vaunted Spaniard Jose Enrique, amidst a flurry of unhappy Twitter messages. Finally, never to be outdone in the controversy stakes (and certainly not on Twitter) was a certain Joey Barton, who appeared to spend most of his time fighting with the board but staying on the right-side of the fans, before making-up with the management team, then leaving for newly promoted QPR on transfer deadline day.
Three more key players had departed, and their replacements seemed a little underwhelming. In came midfielders Yohan Cabaye, Sylvain Marveaux and Mehdi Abeid from France, followed by another Frenchman, albeit from Manchester United, Gabriel Obertan who had endured a nightmare career thus far with the Champions in England. The striking role was filled by yet another Frenchman with experience of the English league with West Ham in Demba Ba. Enrique’s replacement was found in one time promising Italian left-back Davide Santon. Those six players were hardly household names to the average supporter, but somehow manager Alan Pardew has moulded an impressive unit with Cabaye in particular standing out from the bunch. The retuning Ben Arfa from long-term injury also seems like a new signing. Other than an Arsenal in turmoil, Newcastle are yet to face any side fighting for a top-four finish and beyond so sterner tests are to come, although they have beaten their derby rivals and a tough Wolves side away from home, whilst drawing with fellow surprise packages Aston Villa.
Are Newcastle getting the credit they deserve thus far? Probably not. Will they remain unbeaten all season? Again, probably not….but who knows? It’s a funny old game!
Written by Jimmy Areabi
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Fact is that we do not deserve any credit yet, because we have not achieved anything yet. Lets wait until the final game day and our position is cemented, then hand out credit where its due.
But long may this form continue (fingers crossed)
Wow!! I bet your a barrel of laughs to be around on a day to day basis
Listen, be serious you havent played anyone of note yet, apart from a very poor Arsenal side, both of you were equally as crap on that day.
You havent lost a game because you havent played City, United, Liverpool, Chelsea or Tottenham, you have beat Blackburn, Wolves, Fulham and Sunderland….yeh really impressive.
I like a few of your players like Cabaye, Tiote, Ben Arfa and Santon is gonna be great but I will judge you seriously after you play spurs…….I have a feeling that our team with Adebayor linking it all together will destroy you
And I bet you completely missed my point and just decided to insult me instead.
thanks for the input though.
this article was copied from something I read earlier about both villa and newcastle!
Early days and it’s looking promising that’s all.
There again, with Benny, Marveaux and Santon still to come in yet and make their mark, who knows what this season is going to bring?
If we can gain some more wins before we play the string of “big boys” we should be confident going into those games before going on to an excellent final position for the season.
As ever though, a good injury free run would be welcome as well as the purchase of a top drawer striker in January.