Newcastle midfielder Henri Saivet believes he was not given a chance at the club because manager Rafa Benitez was encouraged to play more homegrown players in the fight to stave off relegation.
The 25 year old played just four times for the Magpies and did not feature at all under Benitez after the Spaniard was appointed back in March and has since departed the club, moving to Saint-Etienne on loan.
Speaking to the Northern Echo Saivet said:
“Benitez is a great coach, he focuses a lot on tactics – a little too much at times, but he is a great coach. When it happened (a change of manager) the group was lost, no confidence and there remained ten matches. It was complicated for him – the leaders asked him to play the English. It’s like that there.”
The arrival of a lot of experienced Championship players at the club including Grant Hanley, Matt Ritchie, Dwight Gayle, Mo Diame and Isaac Hayden looks to have been a deliberate policy by Rafa Benitez to ensure that the squad is strong enough to make it through a long season, but the fact that foreign players like DeAndre Yedlin, Matz Sels and Jesus Gamez have also been signed this summer suggests that Rafa is simply looking for players with the right mentality to play at that level. Saivet however clearly thinks otherwise:
“They even said that the championship was for the English, not foreigners, because they have to play every three days and they need to fight as well. We (the foreigners), if we are given the confidence, we could have done that.”
