WITH Newcastle United’s season effectively over, Kevin Keegan dismissed claims his players have nothing to play for between now and May. But the 56-year-old was left hoping he can add sufficient quality to give his squad a fighting chance of ending the season on a high.
On Saturday, Arsenal knocked the Magpies out of the FA Cup, as they already had done in the League Cup. It leaves Newcastle as the only Premier League team realistically out of the running to qualify for next season’s European places yet relatively safe from relegation.
Keegan, however, cannot afford to let his players believe they can take it easy for the rest of another under-achieving season. “There’s a lot to play for,” he argued. “We’re in the bottom half of the table. The biggest thing we’ve got to play for is pride and our first-half performance (against Arsenal) shows we’ve got a lot of pride.” Although Mark Viduka (calf) and Peter Ramage (knee) were the only players Keegan was deprived of through injury at the Emirates, a combination of circumstances decimated his squad.
Emre was suspended after his sending-off in the previous round against Stoke City, Joey Barton not considered while on bail following his alleged involvement in an incident in Liverpool last month, and Obafemi Martins, Geremi, Habib Beye and Abdoulaye Faye at the African Cup of Nations.
“The African Nations has taken four players out of a small squad so we’re asking a lot of these players (who remain),” said Keegan. “They gave it a good shift. It’s just the confidence went in the second half when the goal went in. I’ve got to say, if it had gone on for another 10 minutes you could have seen them getting another two or three.”
Keegan admitted coming to the club halfway through a mid-season transfer window was far from perfect.
“It’s not an ideal scenario,” he said. “I said to Terry Mac (McDermott), it would have been nice if this was pre-season, but it’s not and I knew that. I knew we were going to play Arsenal twice in four days. We’ve got to come back (tomorrow in the league) and do it all again but better next time.”
It is difficult not to feel a little despondent about Sunderland at the moment because no matter what sort of spin you try to put on it, three back to back defeats is difficult to accept....
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