Newcastle were dumped out of the league cup by Nottingham Forest in a dramatic 3-1 game but fans found something to cheer about in the shape of Sean Longstaff’s debut for the club.
The 20-year-old midfielder, who came up the youth ranks at the club, was one of the few players to put in a decent shift in black & white at the City Ground and fans flocked onto Twitter to congratulate him.
Newcastle were always chasing the game last night after going behind to a Daryl Murphy goal in the first two minutes.
They found an equaliser through new summer signing Salomon Rondon in injury time, which should have been enough to take the tie to penalties, but Forest scored again almost immediately.
In a dramatic finish, the referee denied Rafa Benitez’s men an obvious penalty, before Forest broke and scored again to finally put Newcastle to sleep.
Without a win in the Premier League after three games, this is another piece of evidence that this season is going to be tough for Newcastle fans, but in Longstaff they’ve got a brilliant prospect for the future.
Here are the best reactions from Newcastle fans:
Impressed with Sean Longstaff so far. Has found space and used the ball intelligently. Settled into the game well. #nufc
— Miles Starforth (@milesstarforth) August 29, 2018
Spineless performance that mind. Piss poor. Kenedy was awful, again. To be fair, Longstaff was the only decent one on the pitch. Tempo was shocking #nufc
— Andrew Watson (@Poet_or_a_fool) August 29, 2018
There are some players on that pitch that need to have a real good look at themselves
Well done Sean Longstaff good performance#nufc
— Michael Gray (@MJGray1963) August 29, 2018
Only positive so far is sean longstaff #nufc
— Barfield (@_DanielBarfield) August 29, 2018
impressed with sterry an longstaff. shown good pashion. thats it. rest have been shockern. charman shud be up front instead of joselu simple as #nufc
— Alan (@SuperAl1892) August 29, 2018
Longstaff was brilliant tonight by the way. What an excellent debut. Kenedy, Atsu and Muto especially frustrated me. #nufc
— James (@James_NUFC1892) August 29, 2018
A small positive: Longstaff was excellent, best full debut from the academy for a long time.#NUFC
— Binco (@Bincodurham) August 29, 2018
Im gonna say it. Longstaff is the closest thing we have to a like for like replacement for shelvey. Theres a reason the academy boys nicknamed him kroos. #nufc
— mitchnichols (@MB_Magician) August 29, 2018
OPINION
When the very best thing you’ve got to talk about in a cup game is a debut from the Under-23s you know it’s not been a vintage night. To be fair to Newcastle they should have had a chance to even things up from the penalty spot deep into injury time but the referee waved play on. VAR is needed in football, this is yet more proof, but until it’s introduced human error will cary on playing a huge part in the game. Ayoze Perez was beyond angry at the final whistle and it took Rafa Benitez a good few minutes to calm him down and stop him making things worse for his Newcastle side. It doesn’t get any easier unfortunately. The next game is Man City away, the toughest game of the season. Only the deluded and the wild optimists would imagine that Newcastle will come away with anything from that game as the 18/19 season gets off to a really rocky start.