Alan Shearer was impressed by what he saw from Joelinton in Newcastle United’s 3-2 win against West Ham at the London Stadium on Saturday.
Joelinton may have failed to get on the scoresheet for the eighth league game in a row, but the Brazilian still linked up with with the likes of Allan-Saint Maximin and Miguel Almiron to cause a range of problems for the Hammers’ defence.
Newcastle legend Shearer was full of praise for Steve Bruce’s front-three but claims that they should have scored more in the opening 45 minutes of the game.
“The three of them link up superbly well,” Shearer said on Match of the Day on Saturday night.
“I’m pleased for Joelinton, he put in a good performance.
“West Ham could not cope with them, they should have been out of sight at half time.
“They should have had five or six goals.”
OPINION
Joelinton has been criticised a lot in the past few weeks and while he did not score on Saturday, no one can say much bad about his performance against West Ham. Joelinton supplied the assist for Ciaran Clark’s opener and stats by WhoScored, he won four aerial duels, completed three dribbles and made one key pass. Strikers are usually always judged on goals by Joelinton needs to be judged on a lot more than just that, simply because he is playing in a team that does not create that many chances for him. His hold-up play against West Ham was superb and it allowed players like Saint-Maximin and Almiron to bring the ball forward with their pace and dribbling abilities. Joelinton is not really used as a striker who scores goals but again – he is only ever going to be judged on goals by a lot of people who do not see him play. There’s been a lot of talk about Joelinton being dropped, but he does not need that. He just needs to keep on plugging away and putting in performances like this.
