Steve Bruce has admitted that Sean Longstaff has ‘given him food for thought’ after excelling in a different position against Oxford United, as reported by HITC.
The 22-year midfielder was fielded in a more advanced role in Newcastle’s FA Cup fourth-round replay against the U’s at the Kassam Stadium on Tuesday.
Despite playing against League One opposition, the midfielder thrived in his new role, opening the scoring for the Magpies early in the first half.
Speaking after the game, Bruce reflected on Longstaff’s injury issues, claiming his recent performance has given him something to think about in regards to where he plays the midfielder going forward. As reported by HITC, Bruce said:
He had a serious knee injury towards the back end of last season. People tend to forget that. He’ll learn how to cope with that.
Today we gave him a bit of freedom and gave me food for thought because we know he can score a goal. We’ve seen that in training enough.
We gave him that little bit of freedom and I think he enjoyed it and he put in his best performance of the season by a million miles.
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Longstaff’s versatility certainly benefits Newcastle, in our opinion, especially as it allows Bruce to tinker with his options and manoeuvre his squad around in order to test out what works and what doesn’t.
We feel both Matty Longstaff and January loan signing Nabil Bentaleb also performed well behind Longstaff against Oxford, so Bruce may elect to field a similar set-up in the Premier League when the Magpies face Arsenal next weekend.
Bruce is seemingly determined to keep Sean Longstaff at the club for the long run, and despite contract delays appearing to be slightly troubling, the former Aston Villa boss will be delighted if he can tie down a player who can operate in a number of roles with confidence and finesse.
