What we learnt vs Watford

Newcastle United suffered yet another defeat in a disappointing afternoon at St James’ Park.

Watford took the lead early in the first-half, courtesy of Odion Ighalo, and the level of optimism of the Geordie faithful crashed back down to earth immediately. Ighalo doubled the Hornets’ lead midway through the first-half. Newcastle looked down and out – the fans, players and even McClaren looked depleted.

The Magpies did fight hard to get back into the game, but it was too little too late. Here’s what we learnt from today’s game:

Janmaat deserves better

An injured Daryl Janmaat, plying his trade at right-back, single handedly clawed Newcastle back into the game today and it was ridiculous to see. Champions League chasing Moussa Sissoko was anonymous again; Papiss Cisse was a spectator for the first half before being subbed off; the list of underperformers goes on. There were a select few (Mbemba, Perez) who weren’t terrible this afternoon, but Janmaat outclassed his team-mates, once again.

The Dutchman worked a one-two with Moussa Sissoko for his goal, which set Newcastle up for an exciting end to the game, but his team-mates were unable to follow suit and grab the equaliser.

There’s still plenty of time to improve

Newcastle were just one point better off at this point last season and didn’t pick up their first win until gameweek 8, yet we were still fifth by late November. The opposition we played in the opening six games last campaign were not as strong as this season and our manager had also been in charge for three-and-a-half years, not just three months like McClaren.

Like new recruits, McClaren needs time to assess the squad, find his best formation and get the players playing his style. In an ideal world, this would have been sorted in pre-season, but that’s not always possible. It’s not always possible to gauge the quality of a player on a matchday when he’s lining up against York City or Portland Timbers II.

McClaren may have found his best line-up

Ahead of the game McClaren confessed he still didn’t know his best eleven, but I think he might after today’s game. Once Siem de Jong came on, and Georginio Wijnaldum dropped deeper, we improved dramatically. Ayoze Perez caused greater problems than Papiss Cisse did during their short stints up front and Moussa Sissoko could not cope in the center.