Newcastle United co-owner Mehrdad Ghodoussi has sent a message of encouragement to supporters after last nights defeat to AC Milan sent them crashing out of Europe.
Newcastle needed at least a draw to extend their European campaign but came up just a little short despite their best efforts across this group stage.
Ghodoussi took to social media after the game where he thanked the fans for their unwavering support, claimed that Newcastle had deserved to go through and promised that this is only the beginning.
Newcastle have been unfortunate these last few weeks
After what was such an unbelievable season last year, it’s fair to say that some things haven’t exactly worked in Newcastle’s favour during this campaign.
The number of injuries that Eddie Howe’s team have picked up has been massively damaging to some of their results and Nick Pope in particular felt a big miss last night.
The draws in every competition have also been incredibly difficult and the pressure has clearly taken a lot out of the players.
But that’s not to make excuses because ultimately there were better teams in this group than Newcastle who are way ahead of them in terms of their development as a club.
As Mehrdad says in his post, it is just the beginning of what should hopefully be a very bright future and that all these experiences, while painful now, will help the club to grow in the future.
On social media, Ghodoussi said: “Thank you to every one of you for your incredible support tonight. The team gave it their all and took on us on an incredible journey these last few months. We deserved more, but this is football.
“We will pick ourselves up and focus on Saturday. We still have a long season ahead of us. As I’ve said before, we are building something special here and we will continue to grow. The future is bright.”
Newcastle can still take a number of positives from Milan
Newcastle were rather unfortunate to lose on the night having dominated the ball and looked the more threatening team in the first half when the game was in the balance.
But there were some positives to take away from the game with Newcastle having gone toe-to-toe with one of Europe’s best teams.
Lewis Miley, for example, became the youngest player in Champions League history to get an assist for an English club and put in yet another impressive display where he at times looked like Newcastle’s best midfielder.
Joelinton also had a brilliant game and looked like a man possessed when driving at Milan’s defence.
Ghodoussi knows that this is a marathon not a sprint and the ownership are certainly in this for the long haul, so there’s no real need to panic at this stage despite how much the defeat may hurt.
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