Has Mo Diame played his last game for Newcastle United?
Rafael Benitez ticked a lot of boxes when he brought Mo Diame to Newcastle United for £4.5 million. The Senegal international was bringing pace, power, experience and goals from midfield when he joined from Hull City 18 months. Well, he was supposed to bring all of those things.
Instead, Diame has only brought stress, anger and anxiety to fans for the most part and his latest performance should be the beginning of the end for him in the North East.
If it wasn’t obvious before, he’s not good enough for Newcastle.
Diame was given his second Premier League start of the season in this afternoon’s 3-0 defeat by Watford at St James’s Park and the 30-year-old looked well past his best.
It was a sluggish, lazy, apathetic performance from a man who didn’t look like he wanted to be playing. With that in mind, it was an insight into Diame’s attitude, that he was given such a rare chance to impress Benitez and passed it up with such a tame showing.
Sprinting off when subbed on 70 minutes was the quickest he had moved all afternoon and Benitez must surely be tempted to keep him on the bench until January and then sell him.
Jonjo Shelvey is there, Ayoze Perez is there, Mikel Merino is fit again and Isaac Hayden is back from suspension next week. Where does Diame fit in?
He doesn’t and Benitez should focus on finding players who want to play for Newcastle because, based on this afternoon’s performance, Diame clearly doesn’t.
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