There were times in Manchester United’s winter surge when they threatened to charge to the top of the table. Now, however, they are not even the top United in the standings. The most seismic result of Eddie Howe’s time in charge of Newcastle United meant they leapfrogged the other United. Third in the league in April, their Champions League dream is looking increasingly realistic.
If this was a catalytic triumph, enabling them to climb above Erik Ten Hag’s team on goal difference, it was also the flagship result they had largely been lacking. Their best win of the season had been victory at Tottenham: admirable but, in October, scarcely decisive. With the pressure on, they played with renewed purpose, with an incessant energy that Manchester United lacked, and a confidence that they could beat one of the best. They did, utterly deservedly, and a team who lost their way in February are back on a path towards the European elite. Manchester United, meanwhile, could be out of the top four on Monday evening. One never-ending Europa League run could give way to another.
Newcastle are both a club with an expensive, controversial makeover and overachievers. The scorers were two of Steve Bruce’s buys. Joe Willock’s opener could be seen as revenge for the Carabao Cup final defeat or a reward for a player confined to a late cameo at Wembley by injury. More pertinently, after his first-half profligacy, he conjured a breakthrough to spare the draw specialists another stalemate. As Newcastle overpowered their visitors, Willock, a relentless runner, was crucial in that. Newcastle won the midfield battle against a team missing the suspended Casemiro and, so, it was fitting a midfielder scored. Indeed, two were in the box as Bruno Guimaraes chipped a deep cross, Allan Saint-Maximin headed the ball back across goal and Willock applied the finishing touch.
So did a striker. Callum Wilson’s goals have been rarities since the World Cup but just a second was headed in by the substitute from Kieran Trippier’s free kick, This is still a mix-and-match Newcastle team, constructed by different regimes, one with the aim of avoiding relegation, another with rather higher aspirations. The blend of old and new worked well. In Guimaraes, they had the classiest midfielder on show; the other United paid a price for the absence of their own Brazilian, as Marcel Sabitzer and Scott McTominay failed to deputise for Casemiro.
Newcastle also prospered courtesy of the odd man out in the new era and the anomaly who offered excitement amid drudgery in previous seasons. Saint-Maximin has felt an uneasy fit for Howe’s brand of football. He does not track back with the alacrity of Joelinton, but he does possess the ability to torment and tantalise. The wild card proved the trump card. The rampant Frenchman troubled Diogo Dalot, just as he had in the Carabao Cup final; this time, with Aaron Wan-Bissaka ill, Ten Hag did not have the option to switch right-backs. Howe removed Saint-Maximin in a double change after the deadlock was broken; he had been planning a triple substitution before it, and perhaps the winger would have made way. Maybe fortune favoured Newcastle as Saint-Maximin scored before coming off.
His creativity was a reason why Newcastle mustered 22 shots. Manchester United had just one on target; one of the indictments of their display was that their best player embarked on a damage-limitation exercise. For them, St James’ Park is synonymous with a great goalkeeping performance. Peter Schmeichel helped win the league in 1996 with his acrobatics, but David de Gea’s were in vain. The Spaniard made a magnificent double save, diving to his right to parry Alexander Isak’s close-range header and then benefiting when Willock directed the rebound straight at him. Willock was culpable again when blazing over after being set up by Saint-Maximin. After Willock struck, De Gea turned Joelinton’s header on to the bar before Fabian Schar’s header from the follow-up was cleared off the line by Anthony Martial.
The second goal came after the oddity of Ten Hag substituting both centre-backs, Raphael Varane and Lisandro Martinez. Perhaps that was a case of confused thinking. Maybe that rendered it easier for Wilson. Certainly Martinez, punching the seat in the dugout in annoyance, cut a frustrated figure. So did Ten Hag in a touchline argument with Howe, as Steve McClaren served as the peacemaker.
By then, it mattered not that Marcus Rashford had been passed fit to play. He was marginalised. With Wout Weghorst utterly ineffectual and Antony fading after troubling Dan Burn in the early exchanges, Ten Hag’s team failed to score in a third successive league game. Newcastle kept a clean sheet for the first time since January. Nick Pope, banned for the Carabao Cup final, was in effect a spectator again, protected so well, able to enjoy a statement win. Because Newcastle, after a decade-long exile from continental competition, may be headed back to the Champions League.
