Newcastle United manager Eddie Howe is hopeful their away win over Everton can be a turning point in their season, though their wait for Yoane Wissa to make his debut for the club looks set to continue beyond Tuesday’s game with Tottenham.
The Magpies finally claimed their first Premier League away win of an inconsistent season on Saturday as they cruised to a 4-1 win at the Hill Dickinson Stadium thanks to a brace from Malick Thiaw and goals from Lewis Miley and Nick Woltemade.
Newcastle are six points outside the top four in a tight league after recording back-to-back Premier League wins for the first time this season.
Consistency ‘vitally important’ for Newcastle
And, having banished their away demons ahead of successive home games with Tottenham and Burnley, Howe is hopeful his side can build some momentum at any important period in the season.
“It is vitally important that we find the consistency we are searching for,” Howe said. “It seems like we are yo-yoing between Champions League and Premier League and not quite able to put our foot on the floor and find that sweet spot we have been searching for all season.
“Hopefully this is the turning point for us. But every opponent we face in the Premier League is so difficult and now we face Tottenham who are a good team who have their own strengths and a team we are going to have to respect as we always do.
“We always felt, even during some difficult runs, that the league is very tight this year and a consistent run of victories can propel you very quickly up the league.
“We are in a better position than we were, not necessarily in terms of league position but in terms of points gap. A couple of wins and we are back to where we want to be.
“This is a really key time because what you can’t do is allow yourself to become detached. We know where we want to be, we have work to do to get there and we really need a run of games where we have positive results. That is what we are looking for.
“When we are very good in that respect I think we are very difficult to play against. I think we have executed a few games this year where we haven’t been that team and we are nowhere near as effective.
“The game schedule we have, fresh players on the pitch is one thing and then you have to execute the plan. Physically this year the players are going to have to dig deep because there are a lot of games but that was a big step forward against Everton.”
Wissa closing in on debut
Newcastle have greater depth in their squad following the returns of first-choice full-backs Tino Livramento and Lewis Hall, while the impressive showing of Miley will have served as a huge boost to Howe as he looks to make the most of his options in midfield.
Howe’s men would be in an even better position with Wissa available. The DR Congo striker has yet to play for Newcastle since his deadline day move from Brentford after suffering a knee injury on international duty, meaning they have primarily had to rely on club-record signing Woltemade up front.
But Wissa is finally training with his team-mates and Howe revealed he took another step towards his debut as Newcastle were putting Everton to the sword.
“[Wissa] participated in an 11v11 training game while we were at Everton and I think he will have another one at some stage this week,” Howe added. “We will see how close he is.”
Howe had no update on the groin injury to Nick Pope that led Aaron Ramsdale to take his place in goal, but revealed that centre-back Sven Botman is set to see a specialist to assess his back problem.
