As we all anxiously wait and cross our fingers in the hope that Newcastle United bring in a player before the transfer window shuts, I thought it was worth highlighting one signing that Newcastle made over the summer that went slightly under the radar and how SHE can help propel the Magpies up the Premier League table this season.
If there’s one table that you could expect to see Newcastle at the top of last season it was the injury table, as the Magpies suffered over 100 injuries in their last campaign, and as a result Alan Pardew brought in someone to try and help counter that.
That person was Faye Downey who was brought in by Newcastle as a fitness consultant and it’s fair to say she has a large amount of pedigree behind her.
Faye helped the England rugby team prepare for the last two World Cups as England Rugby Union performance director and has also worked with the Leicester Tigers and London Irish.
She clearly has a hard working mentality, shown by one image on her Twitter account that says: “Unless you puke, faint or die, keep going”.
Pardew echoed this as back in July he said: “We’ve worked harder than we have under my management anywhere. We’re really pushing the boundaries here. She’s making sure that we do it in the right manner.”
While Cheick Tiote and Jonas Gutierrez have already picked up injuries this season, it’s impossible to completely eradicate everything, and what is important is keeping as many of your top class players on the pitch for as long as possible.
That was shown on Saturday against Fulham, as Newcastle got stronger as the game went on, and while this was partly due to the introductions from the bench, the likes of Moussa Sissoko and Hatem Ben Arfa kept going until the final whistle.
Newcastle still looked in good nick as Fulham started to tire and as Manchester United have shown over the years, there are a lot of points to be won in the final few minutes.
So, if Newcastle stay away from the top of the injury table and pick up a few late winners and equalisers over the course of the season, make sure that some praise goes Faye Downey’s way!
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Is she fit?
Haha – a very funny article!
“Got stronger as the game went on”?????
So how does one actually get stronger during a match?
What are you on?
We got ‘better’ second half following that magical fitness secret known as “substitutions”
Before yesterdays game it was reported that Krul was also carrying an injury.
In anybody’s books losing 3 major players to injury only 2 weeks into the season is hardly testament to the new fitness regime.
I’d hope that we’d see an improvement in fitness by December – that’s when the players usually combine injury and yellow cards so they can spend Christmas with the family – but we certainly haven’t seen it yet.
archie
get a life mate , stop being bloody pessimistic
toonlol
Oh, sorry Mick
It’s one of THOSE sites, is it?
Appointing this lass is a good idea, she has the right pedigree to make a difference over the course of a season if she stays involved (not sure if this is a short term appointment or an 8 year contract!). If our players are just a bit stronger and fitter it makes a big mental and emotional difference player for player and in the closing stages of a match, that can be the difference between 3 points an 0!