Aston Villa 1-1 Newcastle - Reaction

Newcastle threw away the chance of three points with a 1-1 draw at Villa Park on Saturday night. The Magpies dominated much of the game and were ahead in the first half thanks to an own goal from Tommy Elphick. But extreme profligacy in front of goal combined with increasing willingness to allow Villa back into the game led to an equalising goal from Aaron Tshibola just before injury time.

Here was a stark reminder that Newcastle cannot afford to allow teams back into games, especially when playing a team that, playing with their usual small club mentality, is desperate to get one over on us. Surely this was the fullest Villa Park will be this season, and though there was no beach balls or banners, the unusual fervency of the crowd was another hint that these fans are more interested in watching other teams lose than the home team win. Let’s pray for promotion and hope they don’t join us.

To Newcastle’s performance and, as has been the remit under Benitez, it was solid, competitive and generally disciplined. In truth, Newcastle did more than enough to win this, and Rafa will be deeply frustrated with one point. In particular, Dwight Gayle and Mo Diame must share some of the blame, missing multiple guilt-edged chances. Gayle, perhaps, had an off day. But Diame has done little to impress, and I’m not sure the combination of him and Gayle up front is paying off. Arguably, it shores us up defensively, with Diame more likely to help out in the midfield tussles. But we are losing some dynamism in the final third, becoming over-reliant on a piece of magic from Ritchie or Shelvey to open up the game. It is, perhaps, a tactical issues rather than one of personnel, and Benitez needs to find a way to get more out of his front pairing if he wants to see more success in front of goal.

On the positive side, Yedlin looked excellent before he succumbed to what looked like a muscle injury. He provides far more going forward than Anita, and he shone a lens on Paul Dummett, who, while defensively sound, has zero mobility in forward areas. Once Benitez feels comfortable that Lazaar is up to speed, his arrival should be inevitable. Without an equally speed left back, the team looks unbalanced.

At centre-half both Lascelles and Clark had good games. They can hardly be blamed for whatever part they had in conceding the goal – Newcastle should have been 3 or 4 up by then. The midfield four were all accomplished also, though, I still think we need another central midfielder, because it is clear that beyond Hayden and Shelvey, there is little quality. Tiote’s cameo confirmed that.

We knew September was going to be a hard month. It ends next week, but not before a difficult game at Norwich. Anything positive from that, I would gesture, puts us in good shape for an easier October. We are about where we wanted to be. Now it’s time to cement our position.