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Opinion

Eddie Howe philosophy shames Steve Bruce

2 years ago
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Eddie Howe faces his fifth Newcastle United game on Sunday.

When it comes to results, five points from four games has certainly been an improvement on the three draws and six defeats from nine matches we saw under Steve Bruce.

Despite an easyish set of opening fixtures, the results were shocking before the former head coach’s sacking in October.

It wasn’t just the results that were of concern, performances reflected those results AND one of the things that stuck out so much, was that week in week out the opposition looked to be generally quicker than the NUFC players and have more stamina to see out games.

The opening game of the season summing up that point, as after a decent opening half against West Ham and leading 2-1 at the break, Newcastle United completely faded in the second half, the Hammers scoring three times and NUFC not even having a single effort on target after the break, despite trailing 4-2 from the 66th minute.

In his eight PL games this season, Bruce’s team conceded eleven second-half goals and scored only four after the break, one of those four a comedy own goal from Eric Dier when under no pressure.

It has been well documented this past month, just how hard the Newcastle United players have been working in training, compared to what had gone before. Player after player lining up to make clear Steve Bruce’s training schedule fell way short, in terms of too many days off and not the intensity now faced under Eddie Howe, adding how much they feel they are benefiting. Amongst those extolling the virtues of Howe over Bruce…Wilson, Shelvey, Fraser, Almiron to name but a few.

Newcastle United fans have been proved correct, that their eyes weren’t deceiving them when it came to fitness, or rather lack of, under Steve Bruce.

Eddie Howe talking about his philosophy and declaring: ‘I think any player that takes to the pitch, if they have any doubts on their fitness, it can have a very detrimental affect on performance. So, it is entering the pitch, feeling good. Knowing that you can run harder and longer than your opponent, it is a massive psychological boost.’

Newcastle United fans and players are very much buying into this Eddie Howe philosophy, such a refreshing change to what we had all seen / experienced.

Having the best possible fitness levels does not guarantee success on the pitch BUT it does make it far more likely…

Eddie Howe talking to BBC Newcastle – Friday 10 December 2021:

“Fitness and conditioning has always been a huge part of my philosophy.

“I think if you look back at my Bournemouth team, we prided ourselves on being one of the fittest teams, in all the metrics.

“We paid big attention to that…and that only comes from the work you do on the training pitch.

“That starts from pre-season, all the way through.

“So there is a high demand of the [Newcastle United] players, I’m sure they will tell you that we have pushed them.

“But that’s just what we believe in and I think any player that takes to the pitch, if they have any doubts on their fitness, it can have a very detrimental affect on performance.

“So, it is entering the pitch, feeling good.

“Knowing that you can run harder and longer than your opponent, it is a massive psychological boost.”

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