Ruud van Nistelrooy was full of praise for Newcastle United after they beat his Leicester City side 4-0.
The Magpies returned to winning ways on Saturday, as Newcastle United won 4-0 versus Leicester City at St James’ Park.
It was an emphatic victory for Eddie Howe’s side, who could have scored more on what Newcastle United will hope is a pivotal day in their season.
Lewis Hall was outstanding for Newcastle, while Jacob Murphy continued his impressive form in the final third. The 29-year-old now has four goal contributions in two games, following up his two assists against Brentford with two goals versus the Foxes.
Newcastle player Jacob Murphy celebrates after scoring the first goal during the Premier League match between Newcastle United FC and Leicester Cit...
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Van Nistelrooy shares what ‘clever’ Newcastle United did on Saturday
While Van Nistelrooy was frustrated by Jason Tindall on the touchline on Saturday, the new Leicester City boss was very complimentary about the Magpies.
Van Nistelrooy says Newcastle will help Leicester improve, while the former Manchester United striker has now gone into more detail as to how Eddie Howe’s side hurt his team.
“We have to learn from these games”, he told Optus Sport.
“Newcastle outplayed us in some counterattacks and they were clever in the blocks in the set pieces.
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“We take that. It is a long season, we just started together two weeks ago with some positive results. Now this one is disappointing, but we’ll move on, reflect and get better from this.”
Newcastle scored two goals from clever set pieces
Van Nistelrooy says Newcastle were clever in the way they blocked the Leicester City players from set pieces. That resulted in the Magpies scoring two smart goals – one from a corner and another from a free-kick.
Newcastle have improved from set pieces in recent weeks, after initially struggling in that department.
Eddie Howe’s side are back to being really creative in dead ball situations, and it resulted in them getting their first two goals on Saturday.
Jacob Murphy’s first was made possible by Newcastle clearing the space for him on the edge of the box. You can see Dan Burn stopping Hamza Choudhury from closing Murphy down, which helped the Newcastle winger score the opening goal of the game.
A similar situation resulted in Newcastle’s second. Lewis Hall had a free header to pick out Bruno Guimaraes, after Joelinton cleared the path for the Toon left-back.
It was smart from Newcastle, who started a pivotal week with a really impressive win and performance.