The German international's sense of dressing room humour has captured the imagination of Eddie Howe
Nick Woltemade of Newcastle United celebrates with head coach Eddie Howe
Nick Woltemade of Newcastle United with head coach Eddie Howe (Image: Richard Lee/Shutterstock)
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Newcastle United boss Eddie Howe batted away talk that Nick Woltemade is unhappy on Tyneside, admitting the German international is one of the dressing room jokers already.
The Magpies will need all the team togetherness and high spirits they can get as they head to the Etihad Stadium still looking for their first Premier League win at the venue, despite the first visit stretching back to 2004.
Woltemade had team-mates in stitches when perching his beanie hat on the top of his head as the squad arrived at the Tofiq Bahramov Republican Stadium with the 6ft 6in forward leading the way on what looked more like a lads' getaway than a Champions League test in Baku this week.
Newcastle were furious with some outlets that ran reports that Woltemade was cheesed off with life at Newcastle and wanted to return to the Bundesliga this week. But there is no chance of him leaving for Bayern Munich or his old club Stuttgart.
Despite the internal feeling that Woltemade is settling in quickly at Newcastle, Howe was concerned to see reports from Germany that he was unsettled, while images of him not fully engaged in celebrations after Anthony Gordon tucked home a penalty he wanted to take have also emerged.
But Howe said ahead of the clash with Man City: "He’s got good humour, doesn’t take himself too seriously and he’s one of the lads.
"When I see reports that he’s not happy, that’s not the player that I’m seeing. He’s looked really good on the pitch the last few games, I’ve been really happy with him performing at a really high level and I don’t see any issues."
Howe has been fielding Woltemade in a deeper midfield role in the last two games with the German star grabbing his first goal since December in the 3-1 win at Aston Villa in the FA Cup. His tally for the season is currently 10 with plenty of time to add to it.
At £69million, anything close to 20 goals this season will be deemed a success by fans and pundits. Howe, responding to the talk from Germany he wants to leave, said: "He seems really happy. What you see is what you get with Nick.
"He’s always laughing, he’s been really good in the dressing-room and built up a close friendship with Malick [Thiaw], which is great to see.
"He’s well liked by the group and that’s a really big thing for any player. The guys really like his personality and the fact that he’s very much a team player."
Some critics are baffled by Woltemade, signed as a no.9 to replace Alexander Isak, playing in midfield. But with Bruno Guimaraes out injured and Joelinton just back from a groin injury, Howe has had little choice to be creative.
He said: "We've done a lot of work with him in that position, away from sort of the game day, as much as we can with the limited training time that we have.
"So, yes, when I say we're not training, we're not training to the intense levels, of course, that we would one game a week, but we are turning up, as we will today, and we will train. But then it's what you do in that time that's the really important thing.
"Nick's attitude to his work has been excellent, so we've asked him to play a slightly different role, albeit it's not a million miles from how we were playing with him as the number nine. He was coming low, he was coming deep. It's just he's slightly to one side.
"So I don't see a big, massive issue here. He's a player who plays better in between the lines than stretching the line. I think that's obvious. It's more the defensive work that he has to then grasp, and what we ask of him off the ball."And that's where I have to say, even as a number nine leading the line, his off-the-ball performances were really, really good. "Tactically, he's a very, very intelligent player. He's obviously been well-educated in his former clubs."So he took to it really quickly and full compliment to him for doing that."
Howe knows that trying to rectify Newcastle's wretched record at Man City is the last type of challenge they need after a 5,000 mile journey to Baku and back.
But said: "Every time we've played there, I think we've made mistakes big enough to cost us the game. We've been in the games, they've been competitive, but they have been too good for us on a number of occasions and we need to bridge that gap this weekend.
"Every team you play is beatable. That gives us hope [that we have beaten them before] and the evidence is there that we can win the game. We have to do everything right, tactically, physically. We've done it before and if we turn up we know we can do it."
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