Newcastle United head coach Eddie Howe spoke to the media about his own team's fans booing Anthony Gordon in the 3-2 defeat to Everton at St James' Park
Newcastle United head coach Eddie Howe has backed Anthony Gordon after the player was booed off by home supporters in the 3-2 defeat to Everton after giving the ball away in the build-up to his former club’s winning goal at St James’ Park.
The Magpies boss was asked about the incident in his post-match press conference and said: “I generally wasn’t aware of that. I think in every moment like that, if that is the case, we’ve got to stay together.
“Anthony’s been brilliant for us in recent weeks. I’d certainly back him and support him.”
Howe was left frustrated by twice conceding quickly after equalising. Everton’s second goal from Beto came 105 seconds after Jacob Ramsey made it 1-1, while substitute Thierno Barry’s match-winner was a mere 74 seconds after Jacob Murphy had pegged the visitors back again.
The 48-year-old said: “It’s really hard to give an explanation for that. We’ve worked so hard to get back into the game twice.
“Everton are a tough team to score against. Having to chase the game, you expend a lot of energy doing that and we hurt ourselves with some uncharacteristic errors for both goals (after the equalisers).
“I think the second goal probably affects us mentally as well because I don’t think we played particularly well after that. There was a real spell from the start of the second half until we scored when we were the dominant team and playing well – those moments really cost us the game.”
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Howe added: “Every time I see the players play, I don’t see an attitude problem, I don’t see the players not trying. Sometimes I see the other way, where players are over-trying.
“I’ve not necessarily got a good feeling about the way we’re defending collectively. I felt attacking-wise, we could still do loads better today, but we had enough ball around their box and crossing opportunities and half-chances.
“Sandro had his volley at the end. It could have been a very different result again, but we’re just making too many individual errors that are costing us goals at the other end, and you can’t do that at this level.
“If you look at a lot of the goals we’re conceding, in the Premier League especially and put them together, it’s not good showing for us. We’ll need to focus on that.”
Newcastle United have now kept just two clean sheets in 21 Premier League games and three in 29 matches in all competitions. Howe said: “It’s such a strange one because we started the season so strong defensively on every metric, including clean sheets. We looked like we were really hard to score against but that’s flipped on its head and that’s been coming for us, it’s been building.
“Our defensive resilience and ability to keep the ball out of the net has not been good enough. It was really highlighted by today’s performance, I think there’s no way we should have conceded three goals in that game, but we did.
“It’s something that we’ve really got to focus on. We’ve got to get our dependability back and our reliability back in our defending.”
Newcastle United finished eight places higher than Everton last season as they came fifth, but the result moved the Blues up to eighth, some four points above the Magpies. The boyhood Evertonian pointed the finger over his team’s struggles on juggling their domestic fixtures with Champions League commitments.
Howe said: “Certainly in relation to the Premier League, our form for a while has not been strong enough, it’s not been good enough. We know that, we take responsibility for that.
“It’s been really frustrating for us. That is the perils of Europe I’m afraid.
“We’ve tried to be laser-focused on every game and give every attention to every game with the same importance. But with the deluge of games, your focus can be swayed and our Premier League return in recent weeks has been nowhere near the level that it has been historically.
“Our home form, which has been so reliable for us, has tailed off. We’ve got to try and grab that back as quickly as possible.
“We love playing here. We want this to be the place where we pick up the most points, where the players feel free to play and through our own performances, that hasn’t been the case.”
One of Newcastle’s struggling stars is Nick Woltemade, who joined them for £65million on August 30 as a replacement for Alexander Isak who was heading to Liverpool for a British transfer record £125million. Although the Germany international – who was on Everton’s radar earlier in the summer – netted a sublime goal in the reverse fixture at Hill Dickinson Stadium in the Magpies’ 4-1 win on November 29, he’s now failed to find the net in his last 11 Premier League matches, and produced another lacklustre display, starting in central midfield.
Howe said: “We shuffled it around a bit today. I don’t think we were quick starters and conceded a goal and we needed a fresh impetus in the game and I think the changes helped us, especially in the second half, I thought it was our best period of the game.
“We struggled to get Nick into the game with the amount of ball we would have liked to have done and even when he moved to centre-forward, again, he was short of touches and short of goalmouth involvement, so that’s why we made the changes we did.”
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