Jose Mourinho spoke with passion and honesty both before and after Tuesday night’s Champions League encounter at St James’ Park.
In his pre-match presser, the Benfica boss talked up Eddie Howe’s Newcastle, the great Sir Bobby Robson, the city’s special connection with our team and explained why he’s yet to be in the hotseat on Tyneside.
After the match and a 3-0 beating, the ‘special one’ hailed Newcastle’s ‘horsepower’, speed, intensity and squad depth, accepting the game got away from his side in the second half after their inability to grab the first goal.
Mourinho named Anthony Gordon as our ‘man of the match’ after his goal, assist and electric display, also picking out our ability to bring on Harvey Barnes as a ‘total luxury’, with the £38m man going on to score twice.
See Jose’s honest and in-depth post-match interview below on how the game played out:
“This tells me about the level of Newcastle. We could not compete with their horsepower. We lost being compact and were exposed. It’s just a case of levels. Their second goal was a killer, psychologically.
“The man-of-the-match was Anthony Gordon. Their wingers have pace and power – and they have four of them”
“The danger they posed for us was obviously from set-pieces and everything indirect in the box, because it is difficult to compete with a team with this physicality, but we had great chances to score, three or four. Before they scored, we had a beautiful shot from Lukebakio that hit the post, so I reiterate that the first-half result doesn’t reflect the game at all.
“There is a team with a higher horsepower engine than the other. A team with much more intensity. A team with much more speed.
“As I said in the [pre-match) press conference, Newcastle have four lightning-fast wingers. They don’t have one or two. They have four! And when you change two who come on in the 50th or 60th minute, when you change one and then later change another, we were exposed as we lost the compact play we had in the first half.
“Harvey Barnes on the bench is luxury. Having Barnes on the bench is total luxury. And then they kill us in transition, in speed, in intensity. We couldn’t cope with that.
“If we score a goal before them, if we reach half-time leading, [even if] we reach half-time tied, we can continue with the same type of organisation…
“The second goal, psychologically, kills us. The players felt the second goal deeply, then the game took a different turn, which was tough for us.”