Tim Krul 6/10: Average grade for average performances, his stagnation in general over the past 2-3 seasons is a little sad but that merely makes him a decent PL keeper as opposed to the potentially amazing 21 year old I remember. Season wrecked by injury on international duty.
Rob Elliot 8/10: #Revelation, despite showing no signs of being anything other than reserve keeper fodder throughout his time on Tyneside, he put in a string of match-winning performances to get the team results that in all honesty we didn’t deserve (Bournemouth away springs immediately to mind.) Season wrecked by injury on international duty (where have I heard this before?)
Karl Darlow 6/10: Reasons to give Darlow higher than a 6, his penalty save against Palace to ensure a potentially vital (with hindsight pointless) three points. Reasons to give Darlow lower than a 6, his debut against WBA when he single-handedly lost us the game with constant flapping at aerial balls (and y’know Pulis is quite good at exploiting that.) We’ll call it an average 6.
Jamaal Lascelles 7.5/10: I love this guy. Phenomenal in the tackle, good in the air, decent at attacking set pieces, but most importantly was the only man to front the cameras after our 3-1 defeat to Southampton, widely considered one of the lowest points of a pretty low season by fans. Future captain for sure, he just needs to learn how to pass a ball.
Chancel Mbemba 6/10: A decent first season, occasionally got run ragged by elite forwards (Aguero in particular), but for a “21” year old CB he is a clear prospect who has a very strong all-round game. Highlights include his ability to randomly take on a man from CB positions, which never fails to amuse.
Fabricio Coloccini 4/10: Easily one of the best-performing defenders in the league when we finished 5th, his heart was clearly not at Newcastle for the past 2 seasons and it showed on the pitch, not helped by his natural age-related decline. Best of luck at San Lorenzo Colo, I’ll try to remember the good times.
Steven Taylor 3/10: Some say loyal, others say he never had a chance to go to a better club because he wasn’t good enough. Either way his past few years of continuous season-ending injuries pushed him over the edge, Southampton away in particular was a case study of a man putting his body on the line and being failed by that body not being able to take the physical demands of top-level sport.
Daryl Janmaat 5.5/10: Possibly harsh but reflects the high standards we had as fans. A marvellous attacking full-back last season, he clearly wanted a move this year and his performances reflected that.
Paul Dummett 6/10: If memory serves me right, we had a 40%+ win rate with Paul, as opposed to a 7% one without him. A limited full-back with no attacking dimension to his game, but I like his effort and understated demeanour. And his last minute equalizer against Man Utd was great… so he can have his 6.
Massadio Haidara 5/10: Largely injured, physical but ineffectual when playing.
Jack Colback 5.5/10: Overly restricted and not particularly effective under McClaren, allowed more freedom under Benitez and improved a bit. He still needs to step up next season though.
Siem de Jong 5/10: A man who wanders around the pitch with grace and class, like a pristine Mussorgsky painting. Unfortunately PL football is more like a Picasso, so he’s a little out of place.
Gini Wijnaldum 6/10: 11 goals at home and 0 away speak volumes. Brilliant when the team is working well and in his favoured 10 role, anonymous when the team is under the cosh or played out of position. A talented player, but Liverpool’s move for him is a mystery with better players in his favoured (I’d claim only) role.
Moussa Sissoko 5/10: A rating of 5 for 5 good games? The issue with Moussa isn’t so much laziness as tactics as far as I can see; when he is allowed counter-attacking space to burst forward with his unique blend of pace and power he can’t be bettered, when the game is cagier and relies on close control and a short passing game he comes up short. Even when Rafa gave him the captaincy and coaxed some more hard running out of him, the end results were a bit… meh. Basically, even a fully motivated Moussa will always struggle outside of a handful of situations where the game is set up for him, and when it isn’t set up for him he can easily lose desire and be an active harm to his team. So…. £25m please?
Vurnon Anita 6.5/10: A classy short-passing player, his lack of physical presence has seen him overlooked by various managers, but he found a vital role for the team at full-back when others were injured. A nice guy and a hard worker, and his passing is underrated by those who don’t watch him throughout.
Yoan Gouffran 3/10: Past seasons had witnessed the ineffectual left-winger Gouffran, the blunt lone forward Gouffran and the frustrating wing-back Gouffran. This season saw the introduction of holding midfield Gouffran. First seen during Newcastle’s away game against Man City. Yeah. The one we lost 6-1. Let’s move on.
Jonjo Shelvey 5.5/10: Good passing, good creativity, decent industry. But. He. Is. Not. A. Holder. How it took both McClaren and Rafa numerous games to work this out I will never know, and his inability to track runners and intercept directly led to us losing 3 games at least. Not his fault in the way you couldn’t blame me fully if you forced me to do an Engineering degree as a History grad and realising I’d done terribly, but it did affect his performances.
Henri Saivet 3/10: Henri Saivet? Oh yeah the Football Manager 2009 wonderkid. What’s he been up to since then? He signed for Newcastle in January? No seriously, where is he playing nowadays?
Andros Townsend 7.5/10: Much-needed width and creativity, worth every penny we spent on him and his run of form was genuinely a joy to watch. His direct running offered us an entirely new dimension, only loses out on a higher grade as he tended to fade out of matches when he couldn’t get on the ball.
Florian Thauvin 3.5/10: Went exactly as expected.
Rolando Aarons 5/10: Highly promising but needs to have a run without injuries to fulfil his undoubted potential, great cameo and goal on the last day versus Tottenham.
Gabriel Obertan 2/10: Calling him sh*t would be an insult to the stuff that comes out of my arse occasionally.
Cheick Tiote 6/10: Terrible to begin with, almost moved to China in January, found a new lease of life under Rafa and allowed the entire team to play more proactively with his defensive work.
Ayoze Perez 5.5/10: Clever player, but he needs to work out what his position is and get fit enough to play a run of games, past two seasons he has clearly been flagging by January. Also if he could work out his best position it would help, he’s played every attacking role at Newcastle and not looked a natural fit in any of them.
Papiss Cisse 5/10: It says a lot when you end up using the natural-born poacher as a hold-up man despite him being short and weak. But he worked hard and he never gave up, so I’ll be kind and say a 5.
Aleksandr Mitrovic 5.5/10: Predictably unpredictable. Red cards, goals, passion and more, it definitely wasn’t a dull season for the Serbian (if there ever could be with Mitro…), more worrying than his lack of composure in tackling was his lack of composure in front of goal, but on his day he could be an all-action target man better than most his age. Used particularly well by Rafa as an impact sub.
Seydou Doumbia Lol/10: At least he gave us a better team on FIFA for a few months.
No comments:
Post a Comment