OPINION
It’s been a long and painful wait for Newcastle United winger Miguel Almiron to score his first goal for the club and, while that wait didn’t end on Saturday, there were signs that it surely will soon.
The 25-year-old put in an electric performance in the Magpies’ fantastic 3-2 victory over West Ham United at the London Stadium, which was marred only by the conceding of those two late goals, which made the contest appear much closer than it was.
Almiron had opportunities to break his Newcastle deadlock, and likely should have done, but he was at least getting into terrific positions. He also put in his most impressive performance of the season up against Manuel Pellegrini’s side.
Newcastle head coach Steve Bruce will likely see Saturday’s win as the first big step towards the front three he’s been expecting to see (Almiron, Allan Saint-Maximin and Joelinton).
Almiron and Saint-Maximin, in particular, made life extremely difficult for the beleaguered Hammers backline. It must be said that West Ham were dreadful, but this was still a massive positive for Almiron in a campaign that’s been very light on them.
The statistics demonstrate just how impressive the Paraguay international was on Saturday. As per WhoScored.com, he had four shots – three of them on target – while producing a successful dribble.
He also completed 23 passes with a perfect success rate of 100%. Meanwhile, he produced two crosses and knocked two long balls forward, both of which found their man.
The four shots, and three on target, without finding the back of the net tell us that Almiron needs to continue working on his finishing. But he pulled out all the stops in this game, showing signs of real progression in his positivity, the freedom of his play, and his positioning.
So while the goal we’ve all been waiting for didn’t arrive on Saturday, we saw enough hints to suggest that it may be on its way very soon.
