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Opinion

Steve Bruce pins all goalscoring hopes on striker who hasn’t scored a Premier League goal for 29 months

4 years ago
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The 16 April 2018 was a memorable day for Andy Carroll, he came off the bench in the 86th minute and scored a last minute equaliser for West Ham against Stoke.

Now, when the 2020/21 season kicks off in two weeks time, 29 months later, that remains the last Premier League goal Andy Carroll has scored.

Extending that still further, Andy Carroll has only scored three Premier League goals in the past 41 months.

Yet Steve Bruce is now pinning all goalscoring hopes on a striker who admitted this week that he was never fully fit at any point last season.

This is madness, a special kind of Newcastle United madness.

On The Mag we have been questioning the absence of Joelinton and Yoshinori Muto.

The two strikers haven’t taken any part in pre-season training so far and were nowhere to be seen at yesterday’s friendly against Crewe.

With only 17 days until the season kicks off, The Mail have been the first in the media to break ranks and join in with questions about the missing Joelinton and Muto.

Between Andy Carroll, Yoshinori Muto and Joelinton, they only scored two Premier League goals in total, BUT somebody has to play up front.

Dwight Gayle is a back-up Premier League striker at best but after he limped off during yesterday’s friendly (and Steve Bruce had to put a midfielder on because he had no available strikers to replace Gayle), The Telegraph have given us a worrying update.

Luke Edwards saying that: ‘Dwight Gayle will have scan this afternoon but doesn’t look good according to medical staff. Hyper-extended his knee but extent of damage and time out not yet known. As for signings, no sense of frustration yet so can’t have missed on main targets as things stand.’

Dwight Gayle scored four goals last season to win the top goalscoring striker award at St James Park but it would have been a folly to be relying on him as the main chance of goals.

Now Newcastle have a permacrock who hasn’t scored a PL goal in 29 months as the main / only hope of getting goals up front.

Nothing has changed really, Newcastle United needed to bring in two credible goalscoring strikers this summer and they still need to do so.

However, four and a half weeks into the transfer window and the message is free transfers and maybe loan signings.

Immediate action is needed but that was the case over four weeks ago and indeed ever since Mike Ashley pushed Rafa Benitez, Salomon Rondon and Ayoze Perez out of the door, so he could force through the Joelinton signing.

Now 13 months later, Mike Ashley and his minions won’t even tell us where the club’s record signing is.

I’m not sure whether I should laugh or cry, maybe a bit of both.

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