Football Manager Blog | Football Manager Guru | Magpies Makes Unbeaten Start To The Season

Hi everyone, hope you have all been well after the wheeling and dealing in the transfer market, it was now time to get down to business and see if I can improve on last seasons achievement of finishing 8th. I had five games to play in August. I would start the season off with a game against Everton before I travelled to Wolves. I then had to face Chelsea at Stamford Bridge before finishing the month with a League Cup game against Burton and finally Bolton in the league.

v Everton (h) Barclays Premiership

It was finally here the first game of the season. I had quite a tough encounter for the first game as I was set to play Everton at St James Park. The week building up to this game I had news that Eduardo had picked up an injury and will be out for 2 weeks so I bought Andy Carroll into the starting line up. This change payed dividends when Carroll got on the scoresheet to get the first goal of the season. A cross from Rosicky was met by the head of Carroll and his header was too powerful for Tim Howard to get a hand on it and Newcastle were 1-0 to the good.

The scoreline stayed this way at half time but continuted pressure from the Newcastle forwards soon got their second goal of the game. A throw in that was taken quickly by Jose Enrique fell to the path of Gutierrez and his lay off for Danny Guthrie his well directed low shot went right into the bottom corner of the goal. We had just less than 15 minutes to defend a 2-0 lead and Everton were looking like they were going to score soon.

They did score but not until the 89th minute and Yakubu got his name on the scoresheet. An initial shot from James Vaughan was saved by Consigli but the rebound fell right into Yakubu’s feet to slot the ball into an empty net. The final whistle blew and we had won our first game of the season in the first match. Next up I was set to play Wolves at St James Park.

v Wolves (h) Barclays Premiership

After the good win in the first game of the season I was hopeful that we could get another win in our next game against Wolves they finished 14th last season and they will be hoping to build on that. It was a bit of a scrappy game in the first half as both teams gave the ball away quite a lot but we settled down after 30 minutes and where ahead but the linesman gave the goal for offside and Bent was just the wrong side of the last man.

The score was 0-0 at half time and this was a pretty boring game if you were a neutral. The game finally picked up in the second half and the home side were ahead from an unlikely source of Jose Enrique with only his second ever goal from Newcastle. Just 8 minutes later we had gotten a second of the game and this time it was Darren Bent who scored his first goal since moving from rivals Sunderland.

We hung on well in the last 20 minutes and we had kept up the 100% record this season. Next up was Chelsea at Stamford Bridge.

v Chelsea (a) Barclays Premiership

I had my first away game of the season and what a way to start, with a trip down to Stamford Bridge and also to play the team that denied me an entrance to Europe in the previous season. Chelsea started the better as they wanted to do better than last season and win the league so they were eager to get a good start. We were defending well and were counter attacking whenever possible.

It was only a few moments away from either team scoring. In the 44th minute took the lead from a typical route one goal through Darren Bent. A massive kick from Andrea Consigli fell to Darren Bent he took a touch and saw that Petr Cech was off his line and he brilliantly chipped the ball over the keeper and into the back of the net it was an excellent goal and it took us into a 1-0 half time lead. That goal was perfectly timed just before half time and my players came in full of confidence and this showed in the second half as we started to dominate.

We took up the philosophy of “if the opposition haven’t got the ball then they cannot score” and we kept the ball well. When the final whistle blew I was delighted with the players. We were now top of the league with a 100% record our next game was in the League Cup against Burton Albion.

v Burton (h) League Cup 2nd Round

It was now a time to forget the league and concentrate on the League Cup. I fielded a weakened side as I didn’t want any injuries. I played Eduardo as this was his first game back from injury. Unsurprisingly we dominated the whole game and we took the lead though Eduardo. We soon doubled the lead when my wonderkid signing of Marco Verratti got his first goal in Black and White.

Just before half time we made it three and Eduardo was on the scoresheet this time. Considering that he has only played 45 minutes so far this season and he was coming back from injury I was pleased with the way Eduardo was playing he looked really sharp and I excited for the next league game against Bolton. Just a short post for this game as I didn’t feel that I needed to go into great detail with this game as I felt that the results was a forcone conclusion.

v Bolton (a) Barclays Premiership

The final game of August took me to Reebok Stadium where I had managed a 1-1 in December of last season. It was the visiting side that created the best chances of what was ultimately a poor first half. I was impressed with the way that Bolton were defending especially with Gary Cahill who was really good with some good positioning and some good blocks. It was Cahill who gave Bolton the lead in the 70 minute and it was unsurprisingly from a corner kick.

An outswinging corner from Jerome Thomas was met by the head of Cahill to put Bolton in the lead with only 20 minutes from my Magpies team to get an equaliser. We were getting closer and closer to grapping the goal and with only 6 minutes left of the game we got our just rewards and again Darren Bent was the scorer. A deep cross from Simpson was headered in from Bent from about 7 yards. I was pleased with the fight that we showed to get back into the game. The 100% record had gone but I was still unbeaten in the league for August.

August Results

With 4 wins out of 5 games I was delighted with the start that we made to the season and I was looking forward to the coming months.

August Table

After that brilliant month we were sitting at the top of the Premiership table but both Aston Villa and Arsenal in 2rd and 3rd respectively had a game in hand. Hopefully I can maintain this good run of form and get as many points as possible.

Thanks for reading, next post will be here soon

Warren