Paul Merson verdict on Newcastle United seven weeks into the season… | OneFootball

Paul Merson speaking about Newcastle United.

United with seven weeks of the new season having gone by.

A very intense period of time with NUFC playing every midweek, due to Champions League and Carabao Cup.

Eddie Howe and team now preparing for their next match. A 2pm kick-off on Sunday, home to Nottingham Forest.

Paul Merson discussing how things now stand for Newcastle United as they prepare for this St James’ Park clash.

Paul Merson talking to Sportskeeda ahead of Newcastle v Nottingham Forest:

“What is happening to Nottingham Forest?

“They are in trouble and their upcoming fixtures look very bad.

“Ange Postecoglou will do well if he can outlast this run! Some section of the fans have already voiced their concerns about Postecoglou and it’s quite understandable.

“Forest went from being a solid team under Nuno Espirito Santo to conceding way too many goals after Postecoglou took over.

“Newcastle got blown away by Arsenal last weekend.

“I was honestly surprised by the gulf in class between the two teams in that game.

“Even then, Newcastle were in the lead for about 84 minutes and that tells you this is actually a nightmare game for Nottingham Forest.

“Prediction: Newcastle 1 Arsenal 1”

As Paul Merson points out, things not going too well for Nottingham Forest under Ange Postecoglou.

They are yet to keep a clean sheet under the new manager and in his six games, four defeats and two draws.

Nuno’s final Forest game was a 3-0 home defeat to Sunderland, then under the new boss, three goals also conceded against Swansea, Arsenal and Midtjylland.

If Newcastle United show similar attacking quality to what they did away in the Champions League this week against Union S-G, then there looks to be only one winner for sure on Sunday.

When Paul Merson talks about the ‘gulf in class’ last Sunday when Newcastle lost to Arsenal, I think it was more a case of the Gunners played really well and United didn’t, certainly when it came to retaining the ball and the midfield battle.

Eddie Howe admitted after the match that Newcastle hadn’t played well. In their other two defeats this season, United played far better against both Liverpool and Barcelona, their performances deserving a win against Liverpool even when a man down, whilst their display against Barca was good enough to have taken a point.

Even though against Arsenal the Newcastle team struggled at times to trouble the away side in an attacking sense, the commitment in defence was outstanding and almost brought United a hard fought victory. Sadly, we all know what happened, small margins of an in off the post late Merino header, then even a point denied when if Nick Pope had kept hold of the ball and not tried to initiate a fast break, there would have been no later Arsenal winner deep into added time.

We all know that there are no easy games these days, certainly not in the Premier League or Champions League. However, there are the more winnable matches and having faced arguably the three best teams they will face in the opening five months of the season, Eddie Howe and his players now have plenty of games they can attacking with confidence.

If Newcastle play as well as they did on Wednesday in Belgium, I can’t see anything other than a follow-up victory over Nottingham Forest.

Newcastle United fixtures (All of the Champions League matches will also be available to watch on TV in the UK):

Sunday 5 October– Newcastle v Forest (2pm) Sky Sports

Saturday 18 October – Brighton v Newcastle (3pm)

Tuesday 21 October: Newcastle United vs Benfica (8pm)

Saturday 25 October – Newcastle v Fulham (3pm)

Wednesday 29 October – Newcastle v Spurs (8pm) ITV and Sky Sports

Sunday 2 November – West Ham v Newcastle (2pm) Sky Sports