**We absolutely love Nick Woltemade. The German striker has captured the hearts of many a Newcastle United supporter since his big-money move from VfB Stuttgart this summer.**
Thrust into action earlier than expected, the 6'6" forward has had to adapt to the Premier League on the fly and has managed to score six times for his new club already.
However, away from those goals, Newcastle have a big Woltemade-shaped problem in that they simply don't know how to get the best out of him.
He is an entirely different type of forward to Alexander Isak, who he replaced, and that's causing no end of problems for the Magpies in terms of attacking creativity.
Wayne Rooney struggled to answer Jamie Carragher's question on Nick Woltemade
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Many people have suggested that Woltemade isn't a striker at all, but more of a Number 10, and we definitely agree with that. Hopefully, when Yoane Wissa returns to fitness, Eddie Howe finds a way to play Woltemade off Wissa and inject some urgency into the attack.
For now, though, Newcastle have to learn how to get the best out of what they have, and that's not something they've really managed to do. That's been highlighted by Wayne Rooney's response to Jamie Carragher on The Overlap when he was asked for his thoughts on the 23-year-old.
> “I’m not too sure, to be honest.”
Something has to change
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We've praised Woltemade plenty on here and not really criticised him despite the fact that he has very little impact on games for large periods.
The thing is, we understand that it's not really his fault. He's trying to play his game and he's asking his teammates to play his way and they're still trying to play as if Isak is up top.
Our thing is, we don't know what needs to change. Do we need to alter our entire style to fit one player, or do we potentially nerf one of the most exciting forwards in the game to fit around the team?
While it seems more sensible to change one player rather than an entire system, the fact is our system has become stale and predictable, so perhaps a change is for the best for everyone.