Darren Bent says Newcastle have a ‘really good’ player who needs to improve at shooting

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Darren Bent has urged a Newcastle United player to develop his shooting skills.

So far this season, Newcastle United have lacked goals. Indeed, heading into this weekend’s round of fixtures, only Aston Villa have scored fewer in the Premier League.

Admittedly, it’s not been easy for Newcastle. For much of the season to date, they’ve been playing without a central striker.

The two they have signed arrived with some slight problems, too. Though there have been some promising flashes from Nick Woltemade, he’s still getting used to life in the Premier League. 

Yoane Wissa, meanwhile, is not expected to make his Newcastle United debut before October due to a knee injury.

It means the onus has largely fallen on Anthony Gordon to play up front and though he has tried his best to cover, Bent wants to see an improvement. 

• READ MORE: Who is Anthony Gordon? Age, height, career, position, girlfriend

Darren Bent tells Anthony Gordon to improve his finishing

Speaking on talkSPORT, the former England striker urged Gordon to work on his finishing.

While Bent was full of praise for Gordon, he admitted that he expected his output to have been slightly better even while playing up front.

The 24-year-old has missed chances against Aston Villa, Liverpool and Barcelona this season, although he did eventually score against the Catalan giants in the Champions League. 

“I like Anthony Gordon, but he looks like he’s lacked a little bit of conviction in his finishing,” he said.

“No, he’s not a striker, but I would still expect his numbers to be better than what they are. We all laud him and rightly so that he’s a really good player and he is a really good player.

“But you look at him this season, he’s got one goal this season, and that was in the Champions League and that was a good finish against Barcelona, but he missed a number of chances in that.”

Newcastle United’s record with Anthony Gordon as a striker

It would be foolish to be too harsh on Gordon. He, after all, is a left-winger by trade.

Blaming him alone for Newcastle’s relatively poor record with him as a striker seems incredibly harsh.

Still, it’s an experiment that hasn’t really worked. In the four full games they’ve played with Gordon up front, they’ve only scored one goal from open play. The other came from the penalty spot. 

Newcastle did score two goals against Liverpool earlier this season without a striker, although they came after Gordon was sent off.

Eddie Howe is pleased to have Gordon available for Newcastle’s game against Arsenal on Sunday, but he does need to put in a statement performance after a slow start to the season.