Season 3 - Shaping The Team

We begin our third season at Newcastle and after a mixed second year I'm really looking to push on with this team now. We have set out the aim this season of securing Champions League football through the league place, and we would like to win one of the domestic cups alongside the Europa Conference League. We have once again sold a fair few players including our first two bigger sales of the save and as a result have brought in a lot of talent again to push the players we have on. We have also sent a lot of players out on loan now to try and develop some of the younger purchases with first team football to see where they fit into the team next season as they wasn't going to get game time at us this year. We will go through all the transfers, in, out and loans as well as a quick look at the preseason results, we will also go through the first 3 league games of the season as well as our qualifying match for the Europa Conference League so with lots to get through, lets get into it!

Transfers

Transfers Out

We had a few players we wanted to transfer out of the squad this year as they just wasn't making the cut any more and we were able to move all but one of them on in the end, however we also had two bigger bids for first team players that when we considered what was on the market we were able to accept and go out and improve their positions in our team.

Leo Shahar - £200,000 - Burnley - Shahar was a youngster who in the end just wasn't going to make it compared to the other youngsters we had in his position so we got a bit of money for him before his contract ended at the end of this season.

Travis Hernes - £275,000 - West Brom - Hernes was another youngster not quite making the cut anymore and with a year left on his contract fell into the same bracket. Both of them have got decent moves for themselves so hopefully they can go on to have decent careers but was never going to make it for the direction we are trying to go.

Nick Pope - £15,000,000 - Brighton - Pope had performed very badly for us and had been removed from his position for the second half of last season, we had also identified goalkeeper as a position to improve so it made sense to move him on and we got a decent fee in the end from Brighton who will be looking to get better performances out of him.

Joe Willock - £23,000,000 - Everton - Willock came back to us after his loan to Wolves didn't turn permanent which worried me we were going to miss out on the £22,000,000 we had in that deal but fortunately we were able to add a little more to it as a few teams were interested in taking him. In the end he chose Everton and proves good value for us in terms of money for a player who had fallen out of the pecking order.

Eric Garcia - £45,000,000 - Real Madrid - Garcia was the first of our big sales when Real Madrid came in with a big offer for him, we had only signed him for £18,500,000 so the profit was pretty big on it for us as well. Again when looking at the team in terms of the starting 11, centre back was turning into our weakest position and we had found a few good options we could afford to go and get so we accepted the money for Garcia and went and improved so in the end very happy with this sale.

Sven Botman - £70,000,000 - AC Milan - The other big sale of the window was our other centre back starter in Botman, who we got a massive offer from AC Milan that for someone who appeared to be plateauing as just a decent Premier League centre back we were able to take that money and switch it into a leading centre back to take his place in the team as well. This was a move that worked for all parties as his performances were dropping off at us to the point he had fallen out of the Dutch national team as well.

Players In

As mentioned in the January post we had Adrian Gill joining us for free from Barcelona and now that he is here we're able to get a proper look at him and where he fits in to the squad. As expected he slots in as the third choice centre midfielder option behind Bruno and Miley and has decent potential plus sell on value so very happy to get him in.

Up next is Xavi Espart, another young centre midfielder coming in from Barcelona, this time for just £475,000. He is to be a further back up behind Gill but will be our third choice this year as we send Gill out on loan this season so he's more a short term one to make sure we aren't left short but also someone we can make some money off in the future. Decent little player though and should be able to cover for us if we need it.

Next up is a new fourth choice left winger for us in Stanis Idumbo Muzambo who joins us from Sevilla for just £4,000,000. He was originally going to be the third choice until we made another signing afterwards but he's got a bit of growth in him and the value we should be able to get out of him in just a year or two should more than double how much we have paid for him. Certainly one brought in to boost the levels of our youth teams over the next few years rather than a first team player but can certainly play a role if he's called upon.

Our next signing was a young centre back from Valerenga in Norway. We sign Aleksander Hammer Kjelsen for £4,600,000 and although at the moment is fourth choice centre back on the left hand side, will most likely be moving up to third choice at the end of the season or January when we move Doukoure on who I feel isn't really progressing as well as we wanted him to. Already a pretty good Championship level player we're hoping we can develop him into a Premier League level over the next couple of years and again with him being so cheap, there's always the sell on potential should he falter.

One of the main positions we said we wanted to sign at the end of last season was a new third choice right winger and where else would you go to find a talented young player with lots of potential on a wing than Brazil? We sign Lorran from Flamengo for £13,500,000 and he already looks quite the player but with so much more room to grow at just 19 years old. He can certainly put the pressure on Kuol for second choice over the next two to three years and if he develops as well as our scouts and coaching staff believe he can then he could end up challenging Pino for the starter role. Now we have three exciting players in that position moving forward.

Up next is the new third choice left winger but very much like our right wing roles, is a very exciting young player who can easily push for the starting role over the next couple of years. We bring in 18 year old Mikey Moore from Tottenham for £30,000,000 with the plan being by the time he hits 21 he is comfortably second choice ahead of Barnes and pushing on at Gordon who would be 28/29 at the time. Also with him being English will help with the registration rules for competitions and I am certainly planning for him to end up being one of my main stars for the future.

We then stick with Tottenham as their disappointing season meant they had a few players that could be persuaded to move on, and with us wanting to improve our goalkeeper position, we spent £53,000,000 to lure Guglielmo Vicario away from them. He comes in as our clear number 1 for the next couple of seasons and then depending on the development of our young keepers we will see where we stand with him as he hits the 30's. The thing that made me decide he was the one for me was that he had 13 clean sheets in the Premier League last season despite Spurs finishing down in the bottom half of the league, compared to our keepers who had been leaking goals and keeping those clean sheets was a big factor in our disappointing league campaign.

As you probably guessed by the sales of Garcia and Botman, we needed some new centre backs and for £54,000,000 we brought it Ousmane Diomande from Sporting Lisbon and he immediately becomes our best centre back in the squad whilst also having the potential to get even better as he's only 21. Playing on the right this was an absolute no brainer as a huge improvement on Garcia who we sold for £45,000,000 so I kind of see this one only costing me £9,000,000 when considering how much we sold the guy we were replacing him for. Could easily be our main centre back for the next 10 years so bargain price really.

Another key position we mentioned we wanted to improve was the left back position as we felt we only really had Hall there who was good enough so I wanted to go for someone young like him but with also the current ability and potential to push on. I spent £70,000,000 to secure Myles Lewis-Skelly from Arsenal and I feel I now have the future left back options for the England squad both in my team to push each other on. I will now feel much more comfortable resting Hall when he needs it as MLS is more than good enough to be playing in the Premier League at this point and again the potential of him should really push on Hall if he wants to keep the starting position throughout the years.

The last signing of the window was the replacement for Botman, where we spent £85,000,000 on Marc Guehi from Crystal Palace and again snapped up an experienced player with plenty of years left in him, and also an improvement on the player we sold straight away. He feels like the final piece to our defence this year and I now feel the strength we have in the starting 11 and with the players who are backup to them is far improved to previous seasons.

Loans

We have three types of loans that we've done this year, we have the loans for where we couldn't sell players so hopefully they can play well and drum up some interest in them, we have the loans where we have sent our young players to go get some match experience to push them on to the next level so we can move them up through the leagues over the years whilst they're so young before they can break into our team, and then the final one is the game time for the fringe players so they can come back and push our first team. So if I separate it like that, here's how they break down.

Couldn't Sell Loans

Kyle Fitzgerald - Accrington Stanley - League Two

Tyler Jones - Solihull Moors - National League

Cedwyn Vaulks - Scarborough - National League

Finlay Cross-Adair - Bristol Rovers - League One

Alex Murphy - Preston North End - League One

For Development (Players to watch in future)

Rory Finneran - Stevenage - League One

Jude Cogdan - Charlton - League One

Sam Bexton - Reading - League One

Ajay Hotchkiss - Harrogate Town - National League

Trevan Sanusi - Bristol Rovers - League One

For Development to Push First Team

Lorran - Birmingham City - Championship

Jordan Hackett - Paris FC - Ligue 2 (France)

Stanis Idumbo Muzambo - Birmingham City - Championship

Mycael - Swansea City - Championship

Madi Monamay - Almeria - La Liga (Spain)

Adrian Gill - Bolton - Championship

Pedro Lima - Coventry - Championship

Giacomo Faticanti - West Brom - Championship

Max Moerstedt - FC Nantes - Ligue 1 (France)

Aleksander Hammer Kjelsen - Valerenga - Premiership (Norway)

The Squad

So we've had a lot of movement over the last few years of the squad so below I will go through each position and show you the pecking order we have for them. So in the list I will give you the player, their age, their current ability and their potential ability. The first player named is the first 11 choice currently and it works down in order.

Goalkeeper

Vicario - 28 years old - current 3 star - potential 3 star

Mycael - 21 years old - current 2 star - potential 3 and a half (on loan)

Caprile - 23 years old - current 2 star - potential 3 star

Pordarson - 17 years old - current 1 star - potential 3 star

Right Back

Frimpong - 24 years old - current 3 and a half star - potential 4 star

Livramento - 22 years old - current 3 star - potential 3 and a half

Lima - 19 years old - current 1 and a half star - potential 4 star (on loan)

Right Centre Back

Diomande - 21 years old - current 4 star - potential 5 star

Sildillia - 23 year old - current 3 star - potential 3 star

Monamay - 19 years old - current 2 star - potential 4 star (on loan)

Healy - 17 years old - current 1 star - potential 3 and a half

Barusso - 17 years old - current 1 star - potential 3 star

Left Centre Back

Guehi - 25 years old - current 4 star - potential 4 star

Harwood-Bellis - 23 years old - current 2 and a half star - potential 3 star

Doukoure - 22 years old - current 1 and a half star - potential 4 star

Kjelsen - 19 years old - current 1 and a half star - potential 4 star (on loan)

Hotchkiss - 17 years old - current 1 star - potential 3 and a half (on loan)

Left Back

Hall - 20 years old - current 3 star - potential 5 star

Lewis-Skelly - 18 years old - current 2 star - potential 5 star

Hackett - 21 years old - current 1 and a half star - potential 3 and a half (on loan)

Defensive Midfielder

Tonali - 25 years old - current 4 star - potential 4 star

Klemens - 20 years old - current 2 and a half star - potential 4 star

Faticanti - 21 years old - current 1 and a half star - potential 4 and a half (on loan)

Connell - 17 years old - current 1 star - potential 3 and a half

Centre Mid

Bruno - 27 years old - current 4 star - potential 4 star

Miley - 19 years old - current 2 and a half star - potential 5 star

Gill - 19 years old - current 1 and a half star - potential 3 and a half (on loan)

Finneran - 18 years old - current 1 and a half star - potential 5 star (on loan)

Espart - 18 years old - current 1 and a half star - potential 3 and a half

Advanced Playmaker

Wirtz - 22 years old - current 4 and a half star - potential 4 and a half

Bueno - 21 years old - current 2 star - potential 3 and a half

Nypan - 18 years old - current 2 star - potential 5 star

Cogdan - 18 years old - current 1 star - potential 3 and a half (on loan)

Alimi - 16 years old - current 1 star - potential 5 star

Right Wing

Pino - 22 years old - current 4 and a half star - potential 4 and a half

Kuol - 20 years old - current 2 and a half star - potential 4 star

Lorran - 18 years old - current 2 star - potential 4 and a half (on loan)

Left Wing

Gordon - 24 years old - current 4 star - potential 4 star

Barnes - 27 years old - current 3 and a half star - potential 3 and a half

Moore - 18 years old - current 1 and a half star - potential 5 star

Muzambo - 20 years old - current 1 and a half star - potential 3 and a half (on loan)

Sanusi - 18 years old - current 1 and a half star - potential 3 and a half (on loan)

Striker

Isak - 25 years old - current 3 star - potential 3 and a half

Sesko - 22 years old - current 2 and a half star - potential 3 star

Moerstedt - 19 years old - current 2 star - potential 3 and a half (on loan)

Salia - 18 years old - current 1 and a half star - potential 4 star

Bexton - 18 years old - current 1 star - potential 3 and a half (on loan)

Preseason

Preseason went about as well as we could have hoped, although the teams we were against weren't the most challenging. We scored 19 goals without conceding a single goal across the friendlies and we got in a nice little tour of Australia which should help our merch sales over that side of the world and spread the name of Newcastle further afield.

The Matches

Crystal Palace 1 - 1 Newcastle

Our first game of the season was away to Palace and the worry is that our season is going to play out the same way as it ended last year based on this game. We were completely dominant, having 17 shots with 10 on target compared to their 4 shots and 1 on target whilst also having 68% possession but we did not take our chances and conceded the only chance we gave them. We took the lead nice and early when we took a corner but it went wrong, we recovered the ball n brought it back forward where Hall then played it into Guehi on the edge of the box who smashed one past his old team just 13 minutes in. It looked like just a matter of time before we would get the second, especially when Wirtz tried to play Pino through but it got intercepted, the interception only came central in the box and put Isak through on goal but their keeper was able to make an incredible save to keep it 1-0. Despite our best efforts we couldn't get the second and we were made to pay for it when they broke down their right and played a low cross into the box where Eze met it for a tap in to level it up.

Newcastle 4 - 1 CSKA Sofia (Europa Conference League Qualifying 1st Leg)

The beauty of the way we've built the squad means we now have a very strong second team and it's that team that'll be taking to the Europa Conference League for us in the main. That rotated team made very short work of CSKA Sofia as despite winning 4-1, we were unlucky not to have more had it not been for the offside flag. We got the lead when Miley spreads the ball out wide to Moore on the left and his cross finds Sesko in the middle who's able to tap it in for 1-0. Miley then plays a one-two with Sesko and fires in a second from the edge of the box but Sesko was deemed offside in the build up and it was ruled out. We didn't take too long to get the second however, when Sesko won the ball back in the middle of the park and sends it out wide to Livramento who was coming forward, he whips in a cross perfectly placed for Sesko's run to head in the second. Straight from the kick off though they gave us a scare when they broke down their left and a low cross into the 6 yard box was tapped home to make it 2-1. Lewis-Skelly then took a freekick from deep and dropped it into Kuol who had made a run in behind, and his cutback was deflected in by the defender for our third. Lewis-Skelly then broke down the left again and breaks into the box and his effort was tapped in on the line by Bueno, but the offside flag goes up and Bueno would have been better leaving it to just go in. A very dominant and one sided first half meant this game was pretty much wrapped up. We did add our fourth though when Barnes came central, received the ball from Bruno and then flicked it through for Sesko to get in the box and finish under the keeper to round out his hat trick.

Newcastle 3 - 0 Sheffield United

Back to the Premier League and my first thought was can we stop that awful run of results against newly promoted teams that we adopted last season. Fortunately the team responded and with just 31 seconds on the clock, Bruno plays the ball through the middle of the defence and Isak is able to find some space and fire home from the edge of the area to give us the lead. Ten minutes later Hall goes running into the box and just as he's about to cut it back he is brought down by the defender and we get given a penalty. Isak steps up and sends the keeper the wrong way to make it 2-0. Straight from the kick off we win the ball back and send Isak running through on goal, who unselfishly plays it off to the left for Gordon to finish the chance but he was offside when Isak played it and the goal was disallowed. Bruno was really controlling things from the middle of the field today and he was instrumental in the third goal as well. He was able to cut the defence open with a pass that released Hall who played it back to Gordon who applies the simple finish from close range and makes it 3-0 in half hour. It was a very comfortable first half and in the second half we created more chances but nothing major and completely shut them out to keep it a nice and easy 3-0 win.

CSKA Sofia 1 - 2 Newcastle (Europa Conference League Qualifying 2nd Leg)

With the first leg finishing 4-1 this tie was all but done already but we wanted to keep the momentum going and get another win under our belt at the start of the season. Unfortunately Caprile had to go off injured in the 22nd minute meaning 17 year old Pordarson makes his professional debut in goal. The first half was all us, and we did everything but score a goal. Our best chance came just before half time when Lewis-Skelly got forward down the left and was able to play it into Moore who's effort from close range was well saved meaning we went in at half time 0-0. Of course early in the second half we get punished for our inability to finish today when they get the ball on the left wing and smash it into the far top corner to go 1-0 up. We ended up bringing on some of the first team to try turn this round and eventually get our equaliser when Miley heads away their corner which sends Pino on his way, he runs up to the half way line and then plays it forward to send Isak through who just as he's about to shoot gets clattered from behind and a penalty is given. Isak steps up and smashes it into the top corner to level things up. Then we instantly complete the turnaround when Lewis-Skelly plays it into Wirtz who threads it through for Pino on the opposite side and he's able to hit it hard and low into the far corner to give us the 2-1 win.

Aston Villa 0 - 3 Newcastle

The final game of this little section of the save was an away game to Villa who have been a bit of a bogey team for us and our away form has also been poor over the two seasons so far, so it was a delight to get this level of performance and result out of the team in this game. We made another fast start and after just 17 seconds we should have been 1 up already when Kuol plays Isak through and he was tackled just as he was about to pull the trigger. Instead we got the opener when Gordon recovers a deep cross by Kuol and lays it back to Hall on the edge of the box, who then plays it back to Gordon who has made his way into the box and he curls it into the top corner. The second came when Wirtz played it out to an advancing Frimpong who then sends in a cross which finds Kuol and he's able to slot it under the keeper for 2-0 at half time. Then just after the hour mark Bruno tries to play us forward again and he plays it into Wirtz inside the box who is brought down as he's trying to control it and a penalty is given. This time it's Sesko who steps up but the result is the same as he sends the keeper the wrong way and we go 3-0 up. The rest of the half was pretty quiet in terms of chances but this was a good win for us early in the season.

Competitions

Premier League

A pretty good start for us this year other than the Palace result and so far we're only being beaten by Arsenal, Man City and Wolves who have all won their 3 opening games. It is the 3 newly promoted teams who take the bottom 3 places right from the beginning this year although typically Palace are just above it with their only point being the one they took from us however it's far too early to try any predictions just yet.

Europa Conference League

So the way the Conference League works is all the teams are split into 6 pots and then every team plays 1 team from each one so a total of 6 fixtures to try get as high as we can before going into the knockout stages. We've got a few interesting games in there, but the more difficult ones are looking to be Bologna and Ludogorets who are two teams with a bit of European experience previously.

Next Time

Next up we have the September and October fixtures to get through which include the start of our Conference League campaign and the defence of our Carabao Cup title where we face Rotherham away in our first match in the tournament. We've also got a pretty decent set of fixtures in the league, although Man City will be difficult despite us having a bit of luck against them in the league at our ground in previous seasons. So, are you happy with the transfer window and the look of the squad currently? What would be your aims for this season?