Fascinating Harvey Barnes deal leaves Eddie Howe with welcome selection dilemma for Newcastle attack
Newcastle United have secured their second signing of the summer in Harvey Barnes
Newcastle’s second big name signing to strengthen a Champions League season of adventure has once again stirred the juices on Tyneside.
Harvey Barnes has arrived to join Sandro Tonali in exchange for the thick end of one hundred million quid while Allan Saint-Maximin has either, depending on which way you wish to look at it, jumped ship or been ushered out despite the kind words of Eddie Howe who always sees players off with an apparent reluctance and a cheery compliment.
What is fascinating is that while United have gone like for like, a left winger for a left winger, it certainly complicates the starting eleven against Aston Villa on the opening day of the season if everyone is fit for consideration.
Maxi was not an automatic choice but we must assume that Barnes will start on the left side of a front three with Miggy Almiron on the right because of his goalscoring last season. That being so then United must squeeze in Alexander Isak and Joelinton elsewhere.
Both were often used wide left last season when not in their favoured positions but Barnes has now blocked off that avenue as he has for Anthony Gordon and Jacob Murphy as well. So it looks as though it boils down to either Isak or Callum Wilson at centre-forward rather than both in the side and Joelinton battling Tonali, Bruno Guimaraes, Joe Willock and Sean Longstaff for a place in the midfield three with Elliot Anderson also jostling to elbow himself into the action.
If Isak and Big Joe do get the nod as they did so regularly last time United were on the grass then it means the likes of Wilson, last season’s top scorer, and Willock who was tipped for an England breakthrough running the risk of splinters on the bench.
Another point: where will it all leave Gordon in terms of starting given his £40m transfer fee and his Player Of The Tournament rating when England won the Under 21 Euros this summer. Wide left or right? Centre midfield? False No.9? Amongst the subs?
Terrific, isn’t it, from our point of view and with a four-pronged assault on competitions this season United need to have strength in depth which was the secret of Manchester City’s successful treble winning last campaign. It is just nature being what it is ALL senior players will believe they ought to start but they cannot. A good challenge for Eddie Howe trying to keep his famed ‘one happy family’ spirit going.
Still it is part and parcel of growing success and all will get their chance over a Grand National course but it is going to be interesting. No doubt fans will be down the pub discussing and picking their preferred X1 for the opening day.
The Barnes family already have a strong association with black and white Magpies. Except that it is Notts County, the oldest football club in the world which was formed in 1862 even before the birth of the Football Association.
Harvey’s dad Paul Barnes, a striker, played five seasons for County scoring 19 goals in 67 appearances as part of his journey round the lesser clubs rather than big beasts including Stoke City, Chester, York City, Birmingham, Burnley, Huddersfield, Bury and Doncaster. It got me wondering about father and son footballers. Who are they and how many?
Well, off the top of my head I can think of Frank Lampard and Frank Lampard Jnr, Peter and Kasper Schmeichel, Paul and Tom Ince, Alf-Inge and Erling Haaland, former Newcastle manager Charlie Mitten and John, Ian Wright and Shaun Wright-Phillips, Harry and Jamie Redknapp, Steve and Alex Bruce, Rob and Elliot Lee.
Harvey Barnes is obviously better than his dad but not many can claim that. Probably only Frank Lampard of Chelsea fame, Erling Haaland and Jamie Redknapp. As for Maxi he is joining the latest football revolution. Every so often a country decides to jump on the bandwagon of the most successful sport in the world and splash the cash to try and take a quick route to global recognition. And each time NUFC have made a contribution.
Back in the late seventies it was America who seduced the world’s best like Pele, Franz Beckenbauer, Gerd Muller, Johan Cruyff, George Best, Eusebio, Carlos Alberto and Bobby Moore. United’s contribution was Mike Mahoney and Paul Cannell from their 1976 League Cup final squad and Rocky Hudson.
By the dawn of the noughties China were about to take over with their Super League and off went the likes of Oscar, Carlos Tevez, Mousa Dembele, Marouane Fellaini, and Javier Mascherano. Newcastle weighed in with Cheick Tiote, Demba Ba, Papiss Cisse and manager Rafa Benitez.
Now we have the Saudis and oil money has so far taken Karim Benzema, Roberto Firmino, Ruben Neves, Edouard Mendy, N’Golo Kante, Jota, and Kalidov Koulibaly into the desert along with Steven Gerrard. Saint-Maximin is likely to find that Jordan Henderson and Riyad Mahrez are clinging to his coat tails.
Cynics would say it is the latest rest home for footballers seeking financial comfort above medals, others that it is exciting to be in at the birth of something new and big. For me however the exciting birth of something new and big is what is beginning to happen with Newcastle United.
Leave a Reply