by It was good that it lasted but Newcastle’s European odyssey is over. On a wildly emotional night on Tyneside, Samuel Chukwueze came off the substitutes’ bench in Milan and promptly scored with his first touch to send the Serie A side into the Europa League after Eddie Howe’s slump.
The reality that there will be no more midweek trips to the continent, at least this season, for Howe’s exhausted players finally came as a nasty shock to dishearten Newcastle fans at the end of an evening that Milan had thoroughly enjoyed. on the back foot being bullied by the. first excellent Joelinton and co.
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A place in the last 16 of the Champions League was in sight when Joelinton swept Newcastle into the lead but, in the end, Paris Saint-Germain’s draw at Dortmund was enough to see the Ligue 1 side out of the game.
However, Newcastle’s draw was enough to reach the Europa League but, after Christian Pulisic equalized for Stefano Pioli’s side, fatigue began to affect Howe’s high-pressing assertiveness and Rafael Leão and co sensed an opportunity.
When Leão lost a player it looked like Milan had gone over but then Pioli made three inspired substitutions and the newcomer trio featured in the winner with Luka Jovic and Noah Okafor heavily involved in the elegant passing move that inspired Chukwueze sweeping the ball. Longer than Martin Dubravka a minute later.
All the pre-match talk focused on Newcastle’s third-choice goalkeeper Loris Karius, who could make his first Champions League appearance since his dreadful display in the 2018 final at Liverpool. with Dubravka a late fitness test, leaving Karius to take his place on a thin home bench of just seven players.
He highlighted an injury crisis at St James’ Park which has now seen Newcastle lose three games in a row, but their manager failed to insist that his team “come out with all guns blazing”.
They did not disappoint, continually pushing Milan into blind defensive lines and attacking cul-de-sacs as Pioli paced his technical area in increasingly frenzied fashion.
But as much as Milan’s defense remained a little ersatz – Fikayo Tomori was their only fit specialist in the half – Newcastle’s forward attacking sound and flair was not as much as it promised. Although Mike Maignan looked suitably relieved when Kieran Trippier failed to make a big dive on a dangerously placed free-kick, the Pioli goalkeeper did not work as hard as Howe had hoped.
Or at least not until Joelinton’s shot hit him but because of the great Thomori’s interception courtesy of a great block just as the brutal Miguel Almirón shaped to tap over the line.
Howe was perhaps not very happy that Almiron waited for the loose ball to fall to his left, rather than shooting it straight away, facing Tomori’s intervention.
Meanwhile, Dubravka remained virtually untested as Olivier Giroud and co struggled to stretch the recovering Newcastle keeper. Although Leão, Milan’s talented Portuguese left-winger, showed his destabilizing side from time to time, once tripping Trippier before curling around the world, his he appeared to be a one-man counter-attacking threat.
For long periods Newcastle were indistinguishable from the team that had conceded seven goals in their previous two games against Everton and Tottenham. At times Milan did not know how to handle them and struggled to establish any semblance of a running rhythm.
Hats off to 17-year-old academy graduate Lewis Miley whose typically clever pass paved the way for Joelinton who almost took the roof off the stadium by firing Newcastle into a deserved 33rd minute lead.
After making steady contact, Joelinton’s shot from the edge of the area flew unnecessarily past Maignan. Howe’s left-sided midfielder joined Newcastle as a £40m centre-forward and was delighted to remind everyone exactly why scouts once regarded him as Alan Shearer.
Milan became so dominant temporarily that they used more optimistic long balls and Maignan was so troubled by a perceived lack of defense that he argued long and hard with the referee even after collecting a booking for dissent.
If the visiting goalkeeper had reason to be unhappy with Joelinton being sidelined, it appeared to be little more than an overreaction to the simmering tensions within the Serie A club where the American owners had just arrived having parachuted in Zlatan Ibrahimovic as a special adviser.
Ibrahimovic would surely have grabbed the good shot chance left by Wilson early in the second half but the former Milan and Sweden attacker may have felt faintly hopeful in the way Newcastle finally began to struggle to maintain their early pace and the Pioli players really enjoyed it. a bit of possession as the second half wore on.
When? Monday, 11am. The winner of each group is paired with the runner-up, but teams from the same qualifying group or qualifying country are kept apart.
Group winners: Arsenal, Bayern Munich, Manchester City, Real Madrid, Real Sociedad, Atlético Madrid, Borussia Dortmund, Barcelona
Second place Copenhagen, Internazionale, Napoli, PSV Eindhoven,
RB Leipzig, Lazio, Paris Saint-Germain, Porto
Suddenly, even the great Joelinton began to look human after all. As Howe must have wished Sandro Tonali, his former Milan midfielder, was not serving a 10-month suspension for breaches of Italy’s betting regulations.
The Newcastle manager was left fuming after Pulisic equalized at the end of a move where Tomori connected with Leão’s deep cross only to attempt a shot. Whatever; Giroud slipped the ball across the goal for Pulisic to apply the finishing touch from six yards to make it 1-1.
Despite Maignan doing wonders to push Bruno Guimarães’ glorious strike onto the crossbar, Leão shot wide with the goal at his mercy. He thought he had chances to blow Milan, but Chukwueze had other ideas.
