Newcastle United’s Under 21s haven’t had the best of seasons and today’s game against Norwich was a huge indicator of some big problems our second string currently have.
There were a couple of familiar faces in today’s Newcastle lineup with banished first-teamer Ryan Fraser turning out for the reserves alongside Newcastle’s January signing from West Ham, Harrison Ashby.
Ashby is yet to feature in Eddie Howe’s first team plans but took full advantage of the hour he was given for the Under 21s.
Newcastle U21s got off to a great start against Norwich
The Magpies got off to a brilliant start, buoyed by the two first-team lads. Ryan Fraser opened the scoring after receiving a great ball by Harrison Ashby. The ‘very dangerous‘ Scotland international cut inside and curled a shot into the corner.
Newcastle’s lead was doubled moments later with Harrison Ashby getting on the scoresheet himself.
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Ryan Fraser then turned provider, dinking in a cross for another former West Ham player in Amadou Diallo to nod the ball in off the crossbar make it 3-0 to the home side.
It was about now that the wheels started to come off for United. Thanks to some terrible defending by Newcastle, Fin Welch walked through the defence to pull one back for Norwich. Then Newcastle conceded a penalty before half time which was despatched by Abu Kamara. Newcastle could count themselves lucky to still have 11 men on the pitch at this point too following a foul by goalkeeper Max Thomson.
There’s a lot of work to be done in the youth setup
Norwich’s equalising goal came in the second half as Fin Welsh bagged his second of the game. It looked like it was going to be another one of those days for the stiffs but Lewis Miley popped up with 10 minutes to go to make it 4-3 to Newcastle, curling in an effort from outside the box after a cutback from Diallo.
That win puts the young magpies on level points with Sunderland in the Premier League 2 Division 2, but sitting ninth out of 11 teams isn’t a good look.
While the first team have come on leaps and bounds under the new owners, it’s clear there’s still a lot of work to be done with the youth squads.