After an impressive win against West Ham last week, I headed up to the North East in high spirits albeit slightly hungover! I'd only visited St James' Park once back in 2015 when The Hornets came away with a 2-1 win, in what was a really enjoyable away day so this was one of the first fixtures I looked for back in June.
So to yesterday, after making the long trip up on the train, I realised how under prepared I was the bitterly cold north! After meeting up with some friends who study in Newcastle they confirmed that it is always freezing up there so my moaning fell on death ears.
After a few pre match beers, it was time to embark on the mission of getting to the away end, which if you haven't visited Newcastle before is way up high on level 7. A mammoth 14 flights of stairs later and eventually we had arrived in the away end and found our seats. A lot of people have criticised the fact of where the away end is situated at Newcastle but personally I feel its part of the experience of visiting St James's and the view of the action is superb.
Both teams made a positive start to the game looking to gain a first goal to get a foothold in the match. It led to a particularly open and end to end game but I always felt The Hornets were in control and would take the lead. It only took 19 minutes for the visitors to find the opener, as Kabasele played a superb pass to set away Zeegelaar who found Will Hughes and he made no mistake with the finish. It's the English midfielders second goal in as many games and he is really finding his feet in the Premier League, having a real effect on the team.
The Golden Boys should've been two ahead minutes after the opener, when Zeegelaar again crossed this time for Doucoure but the Frenchman could only divert his effort wide. Up the other end Gomes did well to deny Joselu to keep The Hornets ahead and it came as a reminder that the hosts were very much in the game. For long periods of the opening 45 minutes The Hornets couldn't play their usual football and gave the ball back to The Magpies on many occasions, albeit the hosts failed to make many clear cut chances when they did have the ball.
Despite not being at their best The Hornets went in at the break two ahead, the magnificent Zeegelaar was again involved, as his cross deflected straight into the net off DeAndre Yedlin sending 2000 Watford fans into raptures high up in the Newcastle sky. At half time I had the 'Mag Pie"(Beef and onion) and I have to say its the worst pie I've ever had at a football ground, it was like Newcastles backline... Awful!
Onto to the second half where The Hornets instantly looked for a third goal which would all but kill the game off. Andre Gray had a golden chance as he raced through on goal one-on-one but his attempt was pretty miserable as it harmlessly went wide, when he should've done much better.
Gray did get his goal and he wrapped up the three points for Watford in the process. Richardson raced away on the left hand side before beautifully sending in a curling cross for Gray who stretched to send it home. This led to a mass exit from the 50,000 Newcastle fans, nothing better than the "Pygmies" rocking up and beating the giants in their own back yard. Again.
Gomes made a couple of saves late on to keep back to back clean sheets and on the whole it was largely another gritty team performance which led to a deserved 3 points. Were The Hornets at their best? I'd say not but that leaves a lot of optimism to see what the complete article is like when they do play at their best.
It's two very tough games to come this week as we host Manchester United on Tuesday then Spurs next Saturday where largely the pressure is off. If we can get anything from those games then its a massive achievement and there's no reason we can't. Yes it'll be tough but with the confidence in this side at the moment and the belief amongst the squad if anyone is capable The Hornets are.
Roll on December...
You 'Orns
Newcastle 0-3 Watford
Man Of The Match: Will Hughes (cases could made for a few players)
Away day rating 9/10- Great City, great stadium, terrible pie!
Match rating: 7/10
Next Fixture: Manchester United (H)
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