James Maddison sent message, Son Heung-min woes - 5 things spotted in Newcastle vs Tottenham
Tottenham missed the opportunity to strengthen their push for a Champions League place following a 4-0 humbling at Newcastle United on Saturday afternoon. It is a defeat that has presented top-four rivals Aston Villa will a big opportunity heading into Sunday's Premier League showdown against Arsenal.
Making just the one change from last weekend's win over Nottingham Forest as Rodrigo Bentancur came into the side, Spurs forced a couple of chances early on that Timo Werner passed up. Newcastle, who had created a handful of openings of their own, then took the lead on 30 minutes as Alexander Isak finished in style after Anthony Gordon had played him through.
It was to then get even worse for the Lilywhites two minutes later as the England international helped himself to a goal following some poor play from Pedro Porro. Newcastle added to their lead shortly after the break as Isak was played in by Bruno Guimaraes and he made no mistake after breezing past Micky van de Ven.
There was still time for Eddie Howe's men to add a fourth in the closing stages as Fabian Schar found the net with a towering header from Gordon's corner to complete the scoring. Here are five things we spotted in the game at St James' Park:
Following last weekend's 3-1 win over Nottingham Forest, Postecoglou made just the one change for the game at St. James' Park. Bentancur was the player to come into the XI as he took the place of Pape Matar Sarr in the middle of the pitch.
Bentancur was a substitute in last Sunday's Forest game but he did make a key contribution after helping Spurs regain control in midfield in his 45-minute appearance. Pierre-Emile Hojbjerg was also pivotal to the final result after his introduction at the same time as his teammate, but
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