Coventry City manager Tony Mowbray has revealed that Adam Armstrong went back home to Newcastle over the weekend and went into the club on Sunday and talked with Newcastle´s new manager Rafa Benitez.
Exactly what was said is not known although there have been rumors Adam may be recalled from his Coventry loan spell, but only if some of our strikers cannot start taking some of the chances they keep getting – and missing.
Adam Armstrong – sent to Coventry on loan for season
This is what Mowbray has told the Coventry Telegraph:
“Arma was back there on Sunday, and went and spoke to Rafa,” “He was given two days off after the match on Saturday and went home with his family.”
“And I think he went in off his own bat. I don’t think he was called in. Bottom line is he’s a Newcastle player.”
“I haven’t spoken to anyone at the club and if anyone is going to it will be Coventry Technical Director Mark Venus speaking to their MD, Lee Charnley.”
“But he has been up there, been in the building, seen the manager and is back here in training, so it doesn’t appear as if anything is happening.”
“At this moment, as we sit here now, there doesn’t seem to be any recall.” “I think Rafa realises he’s got 10 games and that’s his senior squad.”
“I watched them against Leicester on Monday night on the telly, and I thought they were unfortunate not to get anything.”
“I am not sitting here overly concerned, because I don’t think he’s going to be recalled. And if he does then we’ll have to get on with it.”
“If he gets called back this week we would look at the loan situation, I’m not sure there’s another star player out there, but we would just want to bring in another option.”
Being a local lad Armstrong was probably as delighted as the rest of us about the Benitez appointment and wanted to go home and go into the club on the off chance he could talk to Rafa.
And it looks like it could simply have been Rafa taking the opportunity to meet with one of Newcastle´s top young stars and having a chat with the 19 year-old.
Rafa will be all too aware that Adam has scored 19 goals in 32 appearances for the Sky Blues this season and he has demonstrated many times how you put the ball in the back of the net.
The only way we see Adam being recalled this season is if our five main strikers, who are all fit now, still have trouble scoring goals – but it would have to be Newcastle doing really poorly for Rafa to recall the Newcastle teenager.
If we stay up it will be interesting to see how Rafa handles Adam – and whether he sends him out on loan next season or thinks he´s already good enough to fight for a first team spot next season.
After all, the Chapel House youngster couldn´t have done much better on loan at Coventry this season.
55 comments so far
G
Mar 16, 2016 at 9:07 AM
Comment #1Think Arma is better off developing at Cov, yet to be convinced he can cut the Prem, but it helps him if he gets a regular game.
cyprus
Mar 16, 2016 at 9:11 AM
Comment #2Sissoko was our best player according to many pundits and sources, so, maybe that was shocking, but Janmaat should have been more alert and all available players were in the same line. He makes mistakes, yes, he don’t play for Barca remember. We’re looking for the culprit, ok, but there’s plenty out there to point the finger to, before this guy.
Ed, I’m holding my deification for Rafa, if that’s ok, holding the euphoria till: he gets me our first victory; he keeps us up!
In the mean time, start that chart of yours for him, like you did for Carver and Steve. That’s what I’ll be using to judge him. Nothing else.
Rotonda heights
Mar 16, 2016 at 9:13 AM
Comment #3Freddy Shepherd: Newcastle MUST beat Sunderland… or they’ll be in serious trouble
– – – – – – –
Name: freddie Shepherd
Subject: the bleeding obvious
Jib
Mar 16, 2016 at 9:25 AM
Comment #4Rory Smith The Times
It took a week for Newcastle’s chief executive, Lee Charnley, to persuade Benitez to take the job — and the risk — at St James’s Park. In the main, the conversations they held didn’t centre on money: how much he would be paid; how much he might expect as a survival bonus; and how much he might have to spend if the worst is averted. Instead, the focus was on something a little less tangible. It was centred on ambition.
Benitez — rightly or wrongly, depending on how you think of him — sees himself as a Champions League coach. He does not want to work for a club who are content with what they are. He wants to work for a team trying to win things, trying to compete, trying to improve. Just trying, in fact, to do anything.
For almost a decade, Newcastle have tried to do nothing except stand still. That is all Mike Ashley’s regime has really wanted: to be a Premier League club, safely ensconced in mid-table, not running the risk of the Europa League or taking a cup competition too seriously in case it diverts them from their main objectives of safety, security and access to the millions of pounds they are due in television rights.
For Newcastle United, it may yet be too late. With 9 games of the season remaining and the rest of the Premier League pulling away, the club’s power brokers finally emerged from their torpor and finally did something. They sacked Steve McClaren, as they must have known they would have to months ago, and appointed Rafael Benitez in his stead.
Benitez’s job, essentially, is to elicit Champions League form from a team that has looked for months like it belongs in the Championship. After their narrow, hard-fought and much-improved defeat at Leicester, Newcastle have nine matches left to save their skins. As a minimum, they must win four, possibly five of them, to have any hope of sending Norwich and Sunderland down in their place. If not, oblivion beckons.
Should the worst happen and Benitez is unable to turn base metal into gold, it will do no good concentrating on what the Spaniard might have done differently. It won’t help to point the finger of blame at the players, to say they might have scored more goals or kept more out, that they could have played better or tried harder. There might be an illusory catharsis on offer from bemoaning and berating McClaren, but even that would be attacking one of the symptoms, not the cause.
No, if it is too late for Newcastle, it is because of something else entirely, something that stands as a salutary lesson for every other club in the Premier League. If it is too late for Newcastle, it is because they, like Aston Villa and Sunderland, have been guilty of a lack of ambition. They are living, falling proof of what happens when a club is infected by stasis.
cyprus
Mar 16, 2016 at 9:49 AM
Comment #5Jib,
How does this guy, or us fans, translate ‘ambition’? It’s easy to use a fancy Greek word (stasis), but it’s still lazy populist journalism. Even statements could be used (see AP, etc.), but it’s money that really talks.
Put your ambition where your money is, or vv.
So, who has spent (net spend) the least in the last 5 years? Mabe NUFC, Villa? Well, it’s championship chasing… Spurs! The not ambitious NUFC ranks 7th, Sunderland 9th. PL leaders Leicester are 14th.
We fxxxxd up big, yes. But it’s not for lack of ambition. Not really at least. Wrong appointments, much more so.
Jib
Mar 16, 2016 at 10:04 AM
Comment #6Cyprus
In an ever changing and evolving entity like the PL , to stay still (stasis) is to actually go backwards. Therefore any money that is spent on transfers that provide players to keep you where you are is actually knocking you backwards.
Rory Smith is right.
VanToonMan
Mar 16, 2016 at 10:05 AM
Comment #7Cyprus you might be right about the net spend rankings but I disagree with your comment about it not being about ambition. As you point out the appointments have been fundamentally wrong and it’s those appointments that are reflective of the lack of ambition.
Going from Pardew to McClaren = a lack of ambition. The guy had just been sacked from a Championship team.
Spurs (who you quote in respect of net spend) – fundamentally went from Redknapp to Pochettino which = ambition because Pochettino had already proven his calibre in the Prem with southampton.
If you look at our managerial appointments pre-Rafa – all of them pretty much reflect a lack of ambition.
I mean Bilic, Koeman – these are big names – bigger names than we have ever had pre-Rafa.
Why is that? Only one answer – the target pre-Rafa has been mediocrity.
I think it has finally changed now and hopefully Rafa keeps us up and then we really can push on in the summer because if Macca got £80million having just come in – I think Rafa will be given MUCH more than that given his calibre and having kept us in the Premier League. It really could be exciting times.
I just hope it’s not too late.
cyprus
Mar 16, 2016 at 10:06 AM
Comment #8Wise, Carr (hence, many players), Carver, AP, JFK, Steve, Black, kid coach, etc. Now there’s your list.
Jib
Mar 16, 2016 at 10:12 AM
Comment #9Cyprus
If you want to go all Greek on me Filodoxía (ambition) is one of the Fates that governed mans lust for rising to the top through power and control.
So again Rory Smith is right
cyprus
Mar 16, 2016 at 10:17 AM
Comment #10Jib,
I’m impressed, as usual. Yep, I do speak Greek, half Geordie only 🙂
I bet that we’d all fundamentally agree (you, VTM) if we elaborated. Appointments. Now, does He say, let’s get a mediocre HC like AP and or Steve? Maybe, but I doubt it.
Jib
Mar 16, 2016 at 10:24 AM
Comment #11Cyprus
We’ll never know , but in other spheres that he operates in he certainly thinks deeply about appointments and doesn’t necessarily always get the best or obvious choice.
Keith Hellawell (ex police drugs supremo ) as CEO for Sports Direct is a case in point , selected I suspect more for the PR value of having a good guy , rather than anything KH knows about selling fancy sandshoes to kids.
posada
Mar 16, 2016 at 10:28 AM
Comment #12Mike Ashley is the biggest fool for putting our club in the hands of clowns.
Some of the deals done were simply shocking.
He will pay the price for that and sadly so will the supporters.
cyprus
Mar 16, 2016 at 10:31 AM
Comment #13To me, he’s a mystery, it ain’t so cut and dry. Apparently ruthless with competitors, soft with the wife, zero hours, super bonuses, wearing an NUFC shirt, shy on TV.
Something tells me he’ll be good for NUFC, with some fortuity, more dosh AND right appointments all round. Hasn’t happened yet of course!!
spaghetti bandit
Mar 16, 2016 at 10:46 AM
Comment #14Re lochinvar
You keep posting watfords games been changed due to fa cup and hope tht they’re still on it but Norwich and sunderland also play everton in there last 3 fixtures,, imagine a Watford everton final,, be jus our luck..
Jib
Mar 16, 2016 at 11:07 AM
Comment #15When Ossie Ardiles was sent packing after a 2 – 5 away loss to Oxford United on Sat 1st Feb 1992 , he was replaced by a sun bronzed Kein Keegan who had been playing golf for months in Andalucia.
It was a week before his 41st birthday and he’d never managed a football team before.
In his first 10 games he managed 17 points including a 1 – 0 home win against Sunderland.
Jib
Mar 16, 2016 at 11:07 AM
Comment #16Kevin even
Blackley and Brownlie
Mar 16, 2016 at 11:20 AM
Comment #17A couple of paragraphs I would highlight from NUFC.com’s report of the game:
“The performance was certainly a vast improvement on the last away defeat at Stoke and individually the players upped their game for the new boss, despite crashing to a seventh straight defeat on the road.”
“But they had themselves to blame for spurning some excellent chances; Moussa Sissoko failed to pick out a colleague, Siem de Jong mis-hit a layoff from Aleksandar Mitrovic and Sissoko and Mitrovic got in each other’s way after Gini Wijnaldum had chipped a ball through.”
Its a seventh straight defeat on the road for a reason. Rafa can help improve performances but he can’t put the ball in the back of the net or stick his head in where it hurts to keep them out at the other end.
I wouldn’t blame Rafa if we lost every game. If he’s to stop the ship hitting the rocks, he’ll need a highly unlikely rockfall to cause a tsunami.
G
Mar 16, 2016 at 11:28 AM
Comment #18Cyprus, by any chance are you Jimmy that did the doors on Black and Whites in Napa in the early 90s?
cyprus
Mar 16, 2016 at 11:28 AM
Comment #19Much in the same vein though we couldn’t blame Steve if he lost every game. Meaning, if players are missing chances he too couldn’t score them for them.
No, if we lose every game, I’ll save just some blaming for him as well. He can’t walk away unscathed.
After all, we are a coaches’ burial ground 🙂
cyprus
Mar 16, 2016 at 11:31 AM
Comment #20G,
no. But he sounds like my kind of guy, black and whites n all. I did Ayia Napa, not like that though.
G
Mar 16, 2016 at 11:33 AM
Comment #21I was serving at Ay Nik between 91 and 96, happy days mate, until those 3RGJs murdered that poor Danish girl anyway.
cyprus
Mar 16, 2016 at 11:36 AM
Comment #22He has ten games, plenty of time. Shearer only had 8, and he still shoulders a good share of the blame. How many games did Carver get?
No, Ed, in fairness, set up that little table of yours. If it looks good come end of the season, I’ll be the first to light him a candle. Not now, not yet.
cyprus
Mar 16, 2016 at 11:38 AM
Comment #23Wow, remember that story. Pathetic mxxxxfxxxxxs. Poor lass.
Ian Toon
Mar 16, 2016 at 11:41 AM
Comment #24Blackley- Give it a rest your negativity is disturbing those lacking Jib’s indomitable spirit. I highlighted yesterday the need for composure under pressure as a key requirement. Defensively and offensively. A top manager/ coach can Instill confidence and believe. Perez should have put us ahead after about 3 minutes. Mitro, Sissoko and Perez didn’t accept responsibility choosing to pass when they should have shot. Benitez will be going through Opta footage and drawing pointers to players attention. He’s not a miracle worker but will make a difference given more time.
It will be all right on the night.
hibbitt
Mar 16, 2016 at 11:43 AM
Comment #25Blackley and Brownlie
your following a very nautical theme so i have to ask have you abandon ship or are you just taking part in board of trade sports ??????
G
Mar 16, 2016 at 11:43 AM
Comment #26Aye, unless Ive missed something in the news, theyre still rotting in a Cypriot prison where life, means life.
toonincheek
Mar 16, 2016 at 12:04 PM
Comment #27G –
That’s what they deserved but they were released
in 2006 after serving 12 years.
Sickening.
Probably even got new identitites when they got back
to the UK.
toonincheek
Mar 16, 2016 at 12:06 PM
Comment #28Should have said – only one of them, I think.
No update on the others and no indication of
why the one was released.
Spacepyramids
Mar 16, 2016 at 12:22 PM
Comment #29Lack of ambition, misplaced appointments, some poor recruitment, selling on players, putting commercial interests ahead of the football club e,g. the short-lived renaming of SJP, disconnection with supporters… Is there not a litany of reasons? Putting my faith in M. Ashely is like putting faith in my self-control – surprisingly good at times but inherently unreliable….
Jib
Mar 16, 2016 at 12:25 PM
Comment #30Ford , Fowler and Pernell had their sentences reduced on appeal , were sent back to the UK and were released around about 2006.
G
Mar 16, 2016 at 12:31 PM
Comment #31Jesus, how did I miss that? Sickening.
Jib
Mar 16, 2016 at 12:34 PM
Comment #32Shelvey is on Sky1 at the mo’ picking his best team
Sliema
Mar 16, 2016 at 12:51 PM
Comment #33Jib
I caught the end of Shelvey’s picks but only Suarez, Torres and Rooney, did you catch the others?
Tsunki
Mar 16, 2016 at 1:18 PM
Comment #34The Times article is pretty much right on. How a businessman can miss the point that business is a competition, and then try and apply a tread water model to a league, which is again a COMPETITION, is head shakingly stupid in it’s conception. Ashley supporters of course point to the ‘generous’ investment of the clubs own operating profit to buy players as ‘ambition’, laughable in itself as it’s plain for all to see that it was a desperate attempt to float the sinking vessel, and that is all it was.
Rafas appointment is the last throw of the dice. If it doesn’t work, the euphoria will subside and the SatNav will be reprogrammed with points of interest in Preston, Rotherham and Brentford. I hope they succeed in rescuing us from the drop. But it will be interesting to see who the manager is in the new season and what will happen to the shape of this woeful squad.
AncientC
Mar 16, 2016 at 1:19 PM
Comment #35G // Mar 16, 2016 at 7:41 AM
“Why do you keep saying Steve is a good guy? He clearly isnt. If he had any sense of honour he would have walked instead of waiting and playing for the sack and pay off. Man is a bloody parasite.”
By that admission, Rafael Benitez is also a parasite.
For note, I do not view either McClaren or Benitez as a”parasite”, contracts should be honoured or bought out.
Jib
Mar 16, 2016 at 1:24 PM
Comment #36nearly all Liverpool
Goalie Pepe Reina
RB Chris Powell (Charlton)
CB Skrtl
CB Agger
LB José Henriqué !!!!!
MF Some Italian Al ——— ?
MF Cannot remember
MF Stevie G
MF Rooney
FWD Suarez
FWD Torres
G
Mar 16, 2016 at 1:29 PM
Comment #37Where has Rafa failed so spectacularly that his honour or integrity has required him to walk? He has earned his living, not stolen it like Macca has at many jobs. Of course, youre just stirring it up to create an argument out of nothing Ancient, typical troll behaviour. I realy cant be bothered with your type, so jog on and hassle somebody else.
Munster Mag
Mar 16, 2016 at 1:37 PM
Comment #38I havent been on much since the Leicester game, but I thought we were dreadful going forward, albeit against a really aggressive team. If SMC had played Sissoko on the left ( where he was shit IMHO ) , we’d have said he was a tool. Why play a right footed player on the left, apart from cutting in and shooting? Dunno, but I didnt think Sissoko was deserving of my praise, but then I’ve been calling him a fraud for a long time. Any thoughts on Sissoko switch to left ??
hibbitt
Mar 16, 2016 at 1:41 PM
Comment #39G
if McClaren is so bad and i think he is why do these clubs keep giving him these jobs with big contracts and then have to pay him off total baffling to me……. one thing no one brings up is the huge payoff he got when he left the england
Jib
Mar 16, 2016 at 1:42 PM
Comment #40I don’t consider Rafa’s appointment as a last throw of the dice.
More another step in the right direction for an owner who is slowly starting to get it.
Even if we fail to stay up I think efforts will be made to keep RB for at least one year.