Finally, Some Fight

Newcastle United had no business leaving Goodison Park with a point Monday night. Anyone saying otherwise is completely delusional.

And even if Shola Ameobi and Demba Ba hadn't combined for what could turn out to be an important equalizing goal, I wouldn't have been angry. Because at least we finally saw the 2012-13 edition of Newcastle wake up.

United was outpassed, outchanced (although not by as big of a margin as you'd think) and, overall, outplayed by a pretty impressive Everton team. Newcastle looked disinterested in the first half, and it wasn't the first sleepy display from this group. It's been a flatline start to the season, a couple of magical moments in an otherwise disjointed opening win against Spurs aside.

Monday's first-half performance was easily the most comatose, though, and Alan Pardew rightly labelled it the worst display since he took over. United looked uncomfortable in a 4-5-1 setup and defended as though Everton's players had forcefields surrounding them. Sylvain Marveaux offered up one of the most invisible showings of all time on the right wing, James Perch looked like his old self at right back and Papiss Cisse called into question whether he should ever again be played alone up top.

The introduction of an apparently angry Demba Ba - allegedly miffed about not starting - finally injected some life into Newcastle's XI. A formation reshuffle helped, too, with Perch looking more like Perchinho in the center of the midfield and Vurnon Anita improving after switching to right back. Shola Ameobi's entrance seemed to bring United up another level.

The defending still wasn't particularly good - we can all agree that Everton was denied two legitimate goals - and there were other holes in the second-half performance.

But at least it provided hope that Newcastle might be ready to kick into a higher gear.

Comments

[JeffC]

Couldn't agree more. In the interest of fair play it was hard to be overly excited about coming out of the match with a point. I'll take it as I'm sure the luck will turn on us at some point this term.

[Jon]

Great point after one of the worst 1st half performances i have seen from us (lucky to be just 1 down). Ba was excellent, and should never be dropped. Cisse was average, though i think he will start to click soon, but he is not a target man.

Everton will feel gutted about the decisions (Though i have no sympathy for them, for the way they have been slagging us off all week .. Horrible club, Horrible fans), but you play to the whistle, no goal was awarded and we were 3 on 1 and the ref decides to bring play back for a foul ... Discrace!!!.

Hopefully it will give the team a bit more confidence about having a go at teams away from home, because we have the players who can cause problems for even the best teams in this division.

[Vassilis Koukoulis]

Agree on your comments for the first half but yhe second half is a tribute to Padrew as much as to the players, he changed the formation and re-positioned a couple of players to great effect

Cisse will come good, all players go a rough time sometimes, Ba deserves to be the number 1 up front to the showings up to now this season.

As for the Everton football club it is time for them to eat their hats after the statements and comments made last week.

[Jaeger]

i hope marveaux gets it through his head on how to put in an effort when he doesn't get picked for the europa game. was standing around watching on that goal and many times in that half. on the other hand, ben arfa looked like he was trying too much. basically took the ball right off of harper and was planning to carry it down the whole length of the field, ended up into a turn over in our third.

ba and shola link up very well especially when shola gets a good first touch on. cabaye looked to waken up a lot more in the 2nd half and it was a nice through ball on the first goal.

hopefully we carry some momentum and intensity into our other matches this week and get 2 wins. and ill definitely take this point even though we lucked out with some calls but thats the human part of the game, and we've been on the other side times as well so it comes and goes. have to deal with it either way.