The talented striker has made his love of Tyneside abundantly clear but that does not appear enough to save his Newcastle career.
Newcastle United fans are used to watching on helplessly as their fan favourites are shunted out the club by Mike Ashley’s profiteering regime. However, it’s not often a bonafide cult hero is left out in the cold by his manager instead, with a potential January departure owing more to an ill-fitting system than a desire to milk every penny out of their cash cow.
With the future of popular yet profligate Aleksandar Mitrovic increasingly uncertain, Rafa Benitez’s decision to leave him out entirely in the 1-0 defeat to Blackburn Rovers would only ever spur on the speculation.
And his reason for doing so, well let’s just say it doesn’t exactly fill fans with confidence that the shark-eyed Serb will still be a Newcastle player come February.
“[The fans] were asking me about Mitrovic or [fellow striker Daryl] Murphy being on the bench,” the Spaniard claimed, as quoted by The Chronicle.
“The way he worked during the training sessions there wasn’t a big difference between one or the other. I think he [Murphy] did really well.”
It’s not like Murphy is a regular feature in the squad. After all, his three minute cameo at Ewood Park were his only minutes in a Newcastle shirt since his summer arrival from Ipswich.
Concurrently, Mitrovic has played less than half an hour of Championship action since his ineffective performance in Newcastle’s previous league fixture against Rovers, an identical 1-0 defeat in November.
The Daily Mail reported last month that Swansea City and Crystal Palace were both keen on bringing Mitrovic back to the Premier League in January and, although both clubs have gone through changes in management since, another no-show by the burly targetman has Newcastle fans fearing the worst.
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