Newcastle United centre back Ciaran Clark has labelled the club’s winless start to the season as ‘pure unlucky’, but has boldly claimed that his side could have taken a point in all five of their games so far.
The Magpies suffered a 2-1 defeat to Arsenal on Saturday, despite Clark’s stoppage time goal, making it four losses out of five in the Premier League this term for Rafael Benitez’s side.
Clark, on a reported £35,000-per-week [Source: Spotrac], feels the team have been unfortunate: “We knew it was going to be tough coming into the first set of fixtures and we have just been pure unlucky,” he told the Chronicle.
“In every game, we could have taken at least a point out of the game, so we have got to keep our chins up, keep going and get back to training on Monday and start again.”
OPINION
It’s easy to dismiss Clark’s claims as sour grapes but the Magpies really have been unfortunate in the way the fixture list fell. To have Tottenham Hotspur, Chelsea, Manchester City and Arsenal in four of their first five games is borderline criminal, and it’s no surprise to see Benitez’s team come away from those games with nothing. They’ve hung in there with all of them, though. Indeed, they’ve lost every one of those matches 2-1. It’s been close each time, despite the manager’s controversial defensive tactics. Things will start to get easier as the fixture list evens itself out, but it’s important that Newcastle get their first win as soon as possible. Clark might actually be on to something here, though. The team have been unlucky not to have been rewarded for their efforts in at least one of those four defeats, so they just have to keep working and look to improve in the future.