Newcastle are at rock bottom. 14th in the Premier League, just 8 lengths from the relegation zone, the Magpies continue to disappoint. Saturday, during the 34th day, Eddie Howe’s men suffered a fourth consecutive defeat in the championship. Worse still, their last success dates back to March 14. In the meantime, the Toons had also suffered the law of FC Barcelona during the round of 16 of the Champions League (1-1; 2-7). A terrible dynamic which does not fail to create internal tensions.
Newcastle is at a standstill
After the defeat against Arsenal, Bruno Guimaraes lost his temper. “It’s the worst season since I’ve been here. We have achieved great things for the club in recent times. In the last four years, since the club’s takeover, we have saved the team from relegation, won a title after 70 years of waiting and participated in the Champions League twice. I don’t know if some players have relaxed a little, overall we’ve relaxed a little, but it’s not a good season. I would say this is a season to forget. We have four games left to play, we know that it is still possible to catch up on seventh or eighth place, which allows us to qualify for Europe.launched the Brazilian midfielder.
While the sporting crisis is in full swing in the metropolitan county of Tyne and Wear, the Nick Woltemade case is also crystallizing tensions. Recruited from Stuttgart last summer for a check for 75 million euros, the St James’ Park striker is having a chaotic first season to say the least. Author of 10 goals and 5 assists in 48 matches in all competitions, the German international (10 caps, 4 goals) is, in fact, far from the hopes placed in him. As a result, against the Gunners, the 1m98 right-hander started the match on the substitutes’ bench before appearing for the last 15 minutes.
Present at a press conference after his team’s new setback, Eddie Howe – who had also decided to do without the services of Yoane Wissa (bought for 57.7 million euros from Brentford last September) – finally justified himself. “As with every player who doesn’t play, they have to show their worth on the training pitch and I think that’s their showcase. For me, choosing them depends on the way they train, their commitment to training, and their ability to put aside individual disappointment for the team in order to come back stronger. It’s a gradual process, but I still believe in these two players. I have no problem with either. I think they have unique qualities to offer the team, but it has to be on merit and deserved..
The Woltemade malaise, a cataclysmic transfer window
A strong speech implying a lack of involvement from the two Newcastle scorers. And the discomfort doesn’t stop there… Yesterday, late in the morning, Woltemade posted two photos on his Instagram feed without a caption. In the process, the journalist from Telegraph Luke Edwards, known to be close to Eddie Howe, published a killer article on the club’s attackers and in particular Woltemade. Result ? Two short hours after the publication of this article, number 27 of the Magpies deleted NUFC from his Instagram bio. A new hiccup illustrating the difficult season experienced by Bruno Guimaraes’ teammates and sanctioning, at the same time, a completely failed 2025 summer transfer window.
As a reminder, if Newcastle had recovered 145 million euros with the sale of Alexander Isak to Liverpool, the choices made by the club’s sporting management clearly did not prove to be winning: 75 million euros spent on Woltemade, almost 58 for Wissa, the same torn check for Elanga, more than 45 million euros sent to Aston Villa to afford Jacob Ramsey without forgetting the 35 million euros spent for Malick Thiaw… Enough to bring the bill to nearly 300 million euros but above all to imagine, as we write these lines, that this Newcastle United transfer window in the summer of 2025 will go down in posterity as the worst of all time. A real industrial disaster which should, logically, not remain without consequences in the weeks to come…
