{"id":10510,"date":"2023-04-14T12:01:09","date_gmt":"2023-04-14T12:01:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/soccer-were-back-to-our\/"},"modified":"2023-04-14T12:07:49","modified_gmt":"2023-04-14T12:07:49","slug":"soccer-were-back-to-our","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/soccer-were-back-to-our\/","title":{"rendered":"Soccer-We’re back to our best, says Newcastle boss Howe"},"content":{"rendered":"

(Reuters) – Newcastle United’s return to form has instilled belief in the squad as they head into the business end of the season, manager Eddie Howe said on Friday, with a Champions League return on the cards for the first time in 20 years.<\/p>\n

After a five-match winless run in the league which saw Newcastle drop out of the top four, they have roared back into contention with five wins in a row. <\/p>\n

The run began with a 2-1 home win over Wolverhampton Wanderers which was followed by a 2-0 victory over fellow Champions League chasers Manchester United. <\/p>\n

Newcastle are third in the Premier League standings with 56 points from 29 games, three clear of fifth-placed Tottenham Hotspur who have played a game more. Newcastle visit Aston Villa on Saturday.<\/p>\n

“I think there’s a growing belief that we’re getting back to our best form after a difficult period around January time, where we were a little bit frustrated with ourselves in the Premier League,” Howe told reporters.<\/p>\n

“I think the Wolves win was a big, big moment for us, it got us back to winning ways. We’ve backed that up with three really tough games over the last week. That was a big test for us mentally and physically, we came through it.<\/p>\n

“Now we go into what I see as the last set of games this season, but a big test to come, nothing’s decided and we’ve got it all to prove “<\/p>\n

Howe praised Villa boss Unai Emery, who has led the club’s revival, with the Spaniard pulling them out of a relegation battle since his appointment.<\/p>\n

Villa are in sublime form, winning six of their last seven matches to move up to sixth and close in on European football next season.<\/p>\n

“He (Emery) has got a clear philosophy. They very rarely change what they do and tactically they’re interesting,” Howe said.<\/p>\n

“They’re going to be a tough challenge for us and we’re going to have to get certain parts of our defensive structures right or they will give us big problems.<\/p>\n

“Their run is a good one and at home they’ve been good, so it’s another tough away game for us.”<\/p>\n

The Newcastle boss said injured winger Allan Saint-Maximin will not play this weekend but midfielder Miguel Almiron is “ahead of schedule” and could return to action soon.<\/p>\n

\n

(Reporting by Pearl Josephine Nazare in Bengaluru; Editing by Toby Davis)<\/p>\n

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(Reuters) – Newcastle United’s return to form has instilled belief in the squad as they head into the business end of the season, manager Eddie Howe said on Friday, with a Champions League return on the cards for the first time in 20 years. After a five-match winless run in the league which saw Newcastle […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":10511,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1219],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10510","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-u-s-sports"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportSportsNews\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ3D0EJ-VIEWIMAGE.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10510","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10510"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10510\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10512,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10510\/revisions\/10512"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10511"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10510"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10510"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10510"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}