Newcastle’s Nick Pope cancels media arrangements following red card

Add as preferred source on Google

Newcastle goalkeeper Nick Pope was set to meet the media on Monday morning, but after the weekend’s events has opted to cancel his arrangements.

As Craig Hope puts it in his Daily Mail report, Pope “doesn’t feel like talking to anyone right now”.

I can’t really blame him on this one, we’ve all done something stupid and then gone into hiding waiting for it to blow over, but most of us won’t have had a gaggle of media bods poised and ready to make you relive that moment over and over again for the entertainment of others.

He’s still a Geordie hero

Nick Pope‘s sending off was really just the cherry on top of the dumpster fire that was a truly awful 12-minute spell that saw Newcastle concede twice before the £10m man‘s farcical red card.

The fact that Newcastle managed to keep the score down to those two goals says a lot about the squad, and on a day where Geordie heads dropped, that should be seen as a massive positive.

Newcastle wouldn’t be where they are this season were it not for Nick Pope. A superb run of clean sheets in the league and a trio of penalty saves in a Carabao Cup shoot-out against Crystal Palace have earned Pope hero status on Tyneside, so this one blot on his record will not do anything to harm his reputation, but it’s easy to see why Pope will be devastated and desperate to avoid the media, especially given the timing of the incident keeping him out of the cup final on Sunday.

25-Man squad rule doesn’t apply to the Carabao Cup

Loris Karius is looking like the clear candidate to step in as Pope’s replacement for Sunday’s cup final as back-up stopper, Martin Dubravka is cup-tied for the game after having represented our opponents earlier in the tournament – something which actually makes him eligible for a winner’s medal should Erik Ten Hag’s men emerge victorious.

Karl Darlow is currently out on loan at Hull which means that the only other option besides Karius is Mark Gillespie who has yet to make an appearance for the Magpies. Fortunately, the 25-man squad rule doesn’t apply to the Carabao Cup otherwise Newcastle would find themselves heading to Wembley with no substitute ‘keeper.