Newcastle United failed to halt Sunderland’s derby dominance at St James’ Park on Sunday as the Mackems made it 11 Premier League derby games in a row without defeat.
After getting off to a flying start, it looked like it was going to be a black and white day, but the problems that have plagued Newcastle’s season came back in force.
Taking the foot off the gas after going a goal up has been one of the biggest issues we’ve had to witness since August. This feeling that one goal wins the game no matter when it’s scored.
Then there’s the second half performance. We wish there were documentary cameras following the club this season because we’d love to get an insight into what happens in the dressing room at half-time. The way we play when we come back out of the changing room suggests that the half-time refreshments are Guinness and pork pies, because we always look sluggish and uninterested.
Alan Shearer pointed at the second-half performance in his full-time rant on X, where he labelled Newcastle as ‘pathetic’.
‘Weak’, lazy and limp’ were also used by a clearly angered Shearer, who slated what proved to be another second half capitulation just a few days on from Tuesday’s horror show in Barcelona.
A pathetic, weak, lazy, limp second half from Newcastle again #NEWSUN
— Alan Shearer (@alanshearer) March 22, 2026
We have to give Shearer lots of credit for managing to avoid using expletives in his post, although we imagine his views on The Rest Is Football podcast could be quite fruity!
The rebuild this summer needs to be extensive. It once again feels unlikely that we’ll be playing in Europe next season, so we may not need to sign as many players this summer as we first thought, but we are about 10 players short of a squad capable of competing on four fronts.
If we lose out on Europe this season, that gives us two summers to bring in the numbers, but it also makes recruitment that much harder.
This is, of course, assuming that the contributing factor to our sluggish second-half performances is simply fatigue. We hope that’s what it is to be honest, because if it’s not that, then we have a much bigger problem.