Eddie Howe marks ‘massive win’ as Newcastle battle to rare away victory
Newcastle had only won once away from home in the Premier League this season.
Eddie Howe celebrated a “massive win” as Newcastle shook off their away day blues to claim only their second Premier League win on the road this season with a 3-1 win over relegation-battling Burnley.
Joelinton struck after just 65 seconds and Yoane Wissa marked his first Premier League start for the club with his first league goal for them to make it 2-0 with only seven minutes gone.
That should have been that against goal-shy Burnley, but Josh Laurent pulled one back in the 23rd minute and Burnley were on top in the second half until Bruno Guimaraes capitalised on a defensive mix-up to add the third in stoppage time.
Although it was not entirely convincing, Howe was not too worried after watching their first away win since they beat Everton 4-1 on November 29, and one that lifts them into the top half.
“It’s a massive win for us,” he said. “I don’t think it really mattered so much in terms of how we did it, we just needed to do it.
“We started really strongly in recognition of how important the game was for us and I can’t praise the players enough for how they battled through. It was never going to be easy in the second half. It was a massive 45 minutes and to get over the line, full credit to the players who saw they game out.”
Wissa has had an injury-disrupted start since his £50million switch from Brentford, but impressed here. After his early goal, he should have had another when heading wide from close range – offering a different threat from Nick Woltemade.
“That was the thinking behind signing the two players, they are very different,” Howe said. “Yoane is more the traditional number nine. He wants to run in behind, he has a very good sense of scoring goals, he’s in the right place at the right time and that was highlighted by his goal.”
It was another hugely disappointing night for Burnley, who battled hard for little reward. Their winless run now stands at 10 games, leaving them six points adrift of safety.
Asked if he had a sense of deja vu after getting nothing from a battling performance, Scott Parker agreed.
“That’s probably the way I feel,” he said. “There’s elements of frustration. We gave ourselves a mountain to climb with the two goals we concede after seven minutes.
“In saying that, when we go 2-0 down, from that point really up until they scored the third…we have as a team absolutely committed and it’s the fine margins again, we can’t just manage to get the goals from the chances we create and we’re on the end of a poor result.
“We’re in a dogfight and we’re going to be in a dogfight for the majority of this season.
“You can see teams wilt away with a lack of energy, lack of commitment or a lack of desire but there’s something in this group that’s elite. At 2-0 down after seven minutes you could see a team wilt away and it could have been a whole lot different but you didn’t see that.”
After the game, Burnley announced captain Josh Cullen suffered an injury to his anterior cruciate ligament in Saturday’s 0-0 draw with Everton, which is expected to rule out the Republic of Ireland midfielder for nine months.
