Newcastle United’s profligacy cost them last weekend and their £10m striker suggests it needs to stop.
Speaking to The Chronicle, Newcastle United striker Dwight Gayle has urged his team-mates to be more ruthless from now until the end of the season.
Newcastle took a backwards step at Bournemouth last weekend, after beating Manchester United 1-0 at St James’s Park in their previous Premier League outing.
The Magpies looked on course for all three points at the Vitality Stadium after a double from Gayle helped United into a 2-0 half-time lead.
But goals in the final 10 minutes from Adam Smith and Dan Gosling cost Rafael Benitez’s side a huge two points in a game that could and should have been put to bed, with a number of Newcastle men missing clear-cut chances prior to the Cherries’ revival.
“We had a lot of chances to break forward and we should have put it to bed. That’s what’s going to happen in the Premier League with the quality you come up against,” he told The Chronicle.
“It’s happened this season to other people and I’m sure it will happen again, but the boys are together and we’re going to look forward to the next game.”
According to Opta, eight teams in the Premier League have missed more big chances than Newcastle (25) this season, though many of them – Manchester City, Spurs and Liverpool, in the top three – create more than enough to begin with, so missing them isn’t a huge disaster when you’ll invariably get another chance.
It’s a different story for Benitez’s side, who have only created 36 big chances in 28 Premier League outings, so it’s clear that United’s proligacy is going to be a lot more costly when there isn’t an abundance of creativity.
The St James’s Park club, who visit Liverpool on Saturday, are only two points above the relegation zone.
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