Soccer

Alexander Isak gives Newcastle liftoff as Tottenham fall to first defeat of season

Ange Postecoglou will be left perplexed by Spurs’ failure to take advantage of dominance

Alexander Isak scores Newcastle United's second goal during the Premier League match against Tottenham Hotspur at St James' Park. Photograph: Matt McNulty/Getty Images
Louise Taylor
Sun Sept 01 2024 - 16:26
Premier League: Newcastle United 2 Tottenham Hotspur 1 (Barnes 37, Isak 78; Burn og 56)

Newcastle’s chief executive has likened the task of reconstructing Newcastle United to building a plane in mid-air and, after this, Eddie Howe will know precisely what Darren Eales meant.

There were moments when Tottenham proved so dominant here that Howe’s team did not merely seem to be running on one engine but with a wing close to falling off and the landing gear jammed.

Precisely how Newcastle ended up taxiing safely towards the final whistle with three points neatly stowed away is something that appears set to puzzle Ange Postecoglou and his Tottenham staff for some considerable time to come.

As recently as Friday, Howe was warning about the need for his club to avoid “tearing ourselves apart” in the aftermath of an underwhelming transfer window. Perhaps heeding that message, Newcastle’s players began as if on a mission to rip Spurs to shreds. They could not sustain it but, just as Tottenham turned imperious, Howe’s team remembered how to counterattack and, against almost all available odds, found a way to win.

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In some respects it all started as it finished. Indeed as, shortly after kick-off, Alexander Isak’s ambitious chip grazed the woodwork and Harvey Barnes sent a shot whistling inches wide, a Tottenham side lacking their injured defender Micky van de Ven looked a little overwhelmed.

Admittedly Pedro Porro’s header soon hit the back of Nick Pope’s net but Ange Postecoglou’s right-back was miles offside and that effort duly disallowed. Although Pape Sarr subsequently raised the visiting tone a little courtesy of a slightly deflected, fiendishly curving, 25-yard shot Pope did well to push around a post, there was plenty on view to reassure the watching Newcastle chairman, Yasir Al-Rumayyan, who had just flown in from Riyadh.

If the post match conversation between Al-Rumayyan, Howe and the club’s sporting director, Paul Mitchell, is unlikely to be have been dull, at least the tension surrounding Newcastle’s forlorn, month-long pursuit of Crystal Palace’s England centre-half Marc Guéhi, is likely to been partly assuaged by the initial strength of the home performance.

Barnes represented a key reason for Tottenham’s travails and never more so than when he connected with Lloyd Kelly’s left-wing cross and volleyed his side into a 37th-minute lead. Given the awkwardly swerving bounce of the ball as it reared up from a slick surface greased by sporadic rain showers, Barnes’s finish was exquisite.

Yet as Gallowgate Enders marvelled at such a sublime execution, Postecoglou’s glare suggested he might shortly be reminding his defence not only that Barnes was unmarked when he scored and James Maddison had lost concentration at the throw-in preceding the goal-creating cross but Kelly seemed to be finding it far too easy to contain the ineffective Wilson Odobert.

Tottenham’s resultant right-sided attacking struggle dictated that, despite, Postecoglou’s team recovering from their wobbly opening to create a series of half-chances and Joelinton needing to temper his midfield aggression after collecting a booking, Pope was rarely stretched to the absolute limit.

As much as Spurs began controlling the tempo and enjoying increased possession, their most menacing first-half shots came from outside the area. In an attempt to change that narrative, Postecoglou replaced Sarr with Brennan Johnson at the interval. With the impressive Johnson now wide on the right and Odobert looking infinitely happier on the left, the match’s entire topography had changed.

As the revamped visitors chased an equaliser only a last ditch sliding tackle from Radu Dragusin, deputising for Van de Ven, denied Alexander Isak a goal.

With Isak and Anthony Gordon ever more subdued and Maddison’s smart manoeuvring reminding everyone why Newcastle were so desperate to sign him last summer, Spurs rallied. Indeed their attacking onslaught left Dan Burn powerless to turn the ball into his own net after Pope had parried a Maddison shot into Johnson’s path and Burn’s attempted goal-line clearance became an own goal.

Tottenham Hotspur's Guglielmo Vicario watches as the ball goes past him for the opening goal of the game scored by Newcastle United's Harvey Barnes. Photograph: Owen Humphreys/PA

Considering that, just before that leveller, Heung-min Son had seen a menacing shot deflected and Porro had hit the crossbar, Newcastle’s swashbuckling start felt like a fast receding memory.

As his team-mates struggled to exit their own half, Kieran Trippier, evidently hoping to come on as a substitute, interrupted his warm-up routine to issue a volley of instructions from the touchline. Howe may have handed Trippier’s old captain’s armband to Bruno Guimarães but old habits clearly die hard.

Evidently unmoved, Howe left Trippier on the bench as he refreshed his team, with Sandro Tonali’s replacement of Sean Longstaff the most notable switch. It marked the Italy midfielder’s Premier League return following a 10-month suspension for breaches of betting regulations.

Yet as Spurs forced a blizzard of corners and Pope stretched every sinew to divert Maddison’s free-kick, Tonali had precious little chance to impose any sort of order on an increasingly bedraggled home midfield.

No matter; Jacob Murphy, on as a substitute, learned all about the art of counter-attacking from the manager who brought him to Tyneside, Rafael Benítez. Accordingly he made the very most of Joelinton’s defence-bisecting pass, racing clear before squaring for Isak to complete a routine tap-in.

As Guglielmo Vicario, the visiting goalkeeper, struggled to comprehend what had just happened, Postecoglou shook his head in disbelief. – Guardian