Garth Crooks says £3m Newcastle player has been playing brilliantly in the last week

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Garth Crooks was very impressed with a key Newcastle United player in their game against Aston Villa as well as their comeback against Luton.

Newcastle showed real quality to defeat the best home team in the Premier League this season as well as their resilience in coming back from 4-2 against Luton to earn a point, though they probably should have taken all three.

For his performances in these games, Crooks has selected Fabian Schar in his BBC’s team of the week after the defender scored a brace against Villa during the week.

Crooks says Schar was brilliant for Newcastle this week

The win against Villa felt as though Newcastle were turning a corner after what had been such a frustrating six weeks or so from the beginning of December where they suffered exits from the Champions League and Carabao Cup.

Their form in the Premier League had also been very poor having lost four games on the spin, so it felt like a really significant moment to emerge victorious at Villa Park, something no one has done this season.

Schar played a key role in that game as the £3m defender grabbed himself two goals from set-pieces, the first goal he’d scored in the league for 18 months and hid first brace since 2019.

Despite this brilliant result, they couldn’t follow it up with a win against newly promoted Luton Town and instead looked to have taken a bit of a step back from their impressive defending against Villa.

On Schar, Crooks said: “No-one could have predicted the outcome of Aston Villa v Newcastle. Newcastle have had the most amazing, if not turbulent, season. A taste of the Champions League left Eddie Howe’s team running on empty at times.

“Meanwhile, Aston Villa had gone on a 17-match unbeaten run in the Premier League on home soil but succumbed to a 3-1 defeat in devastating performance by the Magpies after the winter break gave them enough time to recover.

“Schar performed brilliantly in both penalty boxes, scoring two well-taken goals while at the same time defending admirably. He had a much more difficult time however against Luton in a 4-4 thriller at St James’ Park four days later.

“Newcastle conceded four goals but collected four points from two games and came from behind twice against the Hatters. Newcastle held their nerve and produced a result having been 4-2 down while Luton caved in, the reason I still think they won’t survive.”

Schar has been Newcastle’s best defender this season

With Sven Botman’s injury keeping him out for around three months and Kieran Trippier suffering a rough patch towards the end of December which proved very costly, Schar has been one of the most dependable players for Newcastle.

The 32-year-old has not only played in every single game in the league, FA Cup and Champions League this season, it’s also difficult to remember the last time he had a particularly bad game.

Of course, conceding four to Luton didn’t exactly put anybody in a good light in that Newcastle defence, but there have been some huge individual mistakes this season that would outshine that performance.

There’s definitely an argument to say that Schar has been the best defender in that team which says so much about the character and determination of the centre-back.