Nick Woltemade is enjoying a great start to life at Newcastle United and now he’s achieved something not even Alan Shearer managed.
Newcastle United got off the mark in the Champions League on Wednesday night, smashing the in-form Union Saint-Gilloise 4-0 in Brussels.
It was a performance that left Alan Shearer delighted and exactly what Newcastle needed after a couple of heart-wrenching results of late.
Eddie Howe’s side dominated for the vast majority, with Nick Woltemade getting the opener with a delightful flick from Sandro Tonali’s shot.
The Italian initially tried to claim the goal and it did look as if the ball had taken an unintended deflection off Woltemade or a defender.
However, replays revealed that Woltemade absolutely intended his cheeky flick and the goal was all his.
An impressive Anthony Gordon netted two penalty kicks to kill the game off before Harvey Barnes put the cherry on top by finishing a scintillating counter-attack.
There was a lot in the performance for Newcastle fans to be happy about, especially Woltemade’s classy display, which has seen him achieve a feat that even Shearer didn’t.
- Who is Nick Woltemade? The ‘two-metre Messi-Musiala’ Newcastle United broke transfer record to sign
Nick Woltemade claims a historic Newcastle United record in the Champions League
Woltemade’s genius flick is now his third in just five starts for Newcastle, with the forward already bringing much-needed goals to the side following Alexander Isak’s departure for Liverpool.
With a £69m price tag over his head and Yoane Wissa sidelined, the pressure has been on Woltemade to deliver. Not only is he scoring, but his build-up play has been excellent, too.
The giant German scored on his Premier League debut for the club with a towering header against Wolves and has now netted on his first Champions League start, too.
He has become the first and only player in the history of Newcastle to score in his first starts in the league and Champions League for the club.
Shearer played 16 times in the Champions League, with 10 of them coming for Newcastle.
He managed to score six goals in the Toon’s 2002-03 campaign, but failed to do so on his debut in a 2-0 defeat to Dynamo Kyiv. He would score at home against the Ukrainians, before bagging a hat-trick against Bayer Leverkusen and a brace at the San Siro vs Inter.
Shearer didn’t score in his Premier League debut for Newcastle, either, as that was a 2-0 loss at Everton, but did bag in his first home game against Wimbledon.
Nick Woltemade is already proving Karl-Heinz Rummenigge wrong
Woltemade’s name has already been in the headlines this week, but it was not his own doing.
Newcastle beat Bayern Munich to signing Woltemade in the transfer window, and the Bundesliga champions are obviously still sour about it.
Speaking to Blickpunkt Sport, Bayern executive Karl-Heinz Rummenigge said: “I congratulate Stuttgart, because they found an idiot who paid the money we didn’t want to pay in Munich.”
Both Howe and Joelinton leapt to Woltemade’s defence, with the Brazilian saying: “We are very happy to have Nick here. He is a great player, a great talent. I hope he can continue scoring and do well for us.”
Yet, the best defence for Woltemade is for Woltemade himself to keep on scoring and make only one man look like an ‘idiot.’
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