Newcastle’s Saudi owners emboldened by cup glory: ‘The first but not the last’ ...Middle East

“Surreal” was how Newcastle United hero Dan Burn described the feeling of English football’s longest hard luck story finally turning.

It was a neat summary of Newcastle’s happy dilemma from here. They have been defined as serial underachievers for so long but now feels like an opportunity to forge a new identity.

A transformative win at Wembley is viewed internally as a springboard to something bigger.

So what comes next for the Magpies?

Sunday night’s party stretched long into the night, families invited into the team’s inner sanctum to celebrate a generational achievement. Players who stopped to talk to journalists in the mixed zone were dragged away by teammates, eager to share a moment which will – thanks to a quirk in the calendar – prove all too fleeting.

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For the club’s internationals, including new England call-up Burn, Monday was about airport check-ins or an early morning drive to St George’s Park. For the rest of the squad there is a warm weather training camp in Dubai, pre-arranged by Howe with one eye on a run-in that offers an opportunity to rejoin the Champions League elite.

“I just wish we were in Newcastle with the fans. This is for them, they deserve it,” a beaming Joelinton told The i Paper on Sunday night.

They will get their moment to celebrate soon. It is understood that the blank weekend at the end of the month – it might be worth ringing Saturday, 29 March, Newcastle fans – is being earmarked for an official celebration. A sizeable drinks order has already been placed with the Town Moor – which is where Newcastle were going to celebrate had they won in 2023 – the favoured venue.

All of that is to be confirmed but, judging by the scenes in Newcastle and London on Sunday, it will be some party before they welcome Brentford on 2 April under the St James’ Park lights. Expect it to run and run.

An (even more) emboldened Eddie Howe

A little insight into the genius of Newcastle’s manager. At half-time he showed his players a slide with detailed stats showing how their physical output has dipped significantly in the first 15 minutes of the second half in previous games.

“He made a really big thing of it,” Burn said. Howe is meticulous to a fault but it is his emotional intelligence that is so underrated. Knowing the right time to deploy those statistics is part of what makes him the best Newcastle manager since the 1950s.

It worked, with Newcastle continuing to go for Liverpool’s jugular after the break. “We have been guilty of protecting leads in the past but we just didn’t want to take a backward step,” Burn says.

This ends any lingering debate about what Newcastle have in Howe. The complaints from a small minority as a tough campaign has ebbed and flowed now look suitably ridiculous. When it mattered, with resources reduced because of injury and suspensions, he ticked every box required of him tactically.

And what of the accusation that he is too reliant on a cadre of players he should have upgraded months ago, blinded by loyalty? It was always a load of rubbish.

He is hard on his players – preceding a recent training session to warn the players that sloppiness he felt had creeped into their efforts could not be tolerated – and does not indulge those who day dream of bigger or better things. Also let the record show that Newcastle’s best player on Sunday was Burn. Kieran Trippier, who Howe has fought tooth and nail to keep in each of the last three transfer windows, wasn’t far behind.

Joelinton, whose career he has revived, was colossal and this felt like a triumph for that old-fashioned notion of a manager’s instinct. Howe prizes unity and spirit and believes that extends beyond the first XI. Sean Longstaff and Callum Wilson came on in the closing stages. Joe Willock made a telling contribution.

The club’s hierarchy have always rated Howe highly – “He belongs in the category of elite manager,” was the verdict of one club insider earlier this season – but his hand has been significantly strengthened in the process of building Newcastle’s future.

They are wise to prize him. There has been interest in Howe recently – England might have progressed had he not signalled his loyalty to Newcastle, while he featured in Liverpool’s thinking – and now he has silverware on his CV it feels inevitable the club’s resolve will be tested somewhere down the line. A further contract extension (he signed one secretly last summer) to reflect the scale of his achievement might be an idea.

Snapping the long streak without silverware is a significant moment for Newcastle and both Burn and Joelinton said they hope it can be the “first of many” trophies for the club.

Psychologically it is a huge boon: the next one will not be accompanied by nearly so much nostalgia. They looked like they belonged on the stage this weekend, which is a remarkable transformation from the black and white rabbits in headlights of 2023.

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“I’ve said it before – and I didn’t like saying it – but it felt like a burden, I think, how long it had been,” Burn said.

“We’ve felt the pressure but I felt it was just going to take that one time to break through that ceiling. Hopefully that’s the start of many.”

Practically it feels just as important for Newcastle’s sales pitch to prospective players and those in the current squad that they want to keep that they are now a club where you can win things and enhance your CV.

So much has been made of Alexander Isak’s future but we have moved quickly to a point where Newcastle are capable of beating the clubs he is linked with. Any Arsenal or Liverpool fan now clinging to the notion that Newcastle are the feeder club of old has surely been disabused of that idea.

It may yet get better. Momentum might be back on Newcastle’s side in the hunt for one of the five places England will be given in the Champions League, with a run of generous fixtures when they return from the international break and players returning.

Phase two is coming, with PIF’s ‘absolute’ backing

The presence of chairman Yasir Al-Rumayyan, the governor of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF), was a reminder of the driving force of this Newcastle story. There is de facto state backing for the club, and from a country whose human rights record does not always stand up to scrutiny.

But it is also not some sporting leviathan prepared to write blank cheques to get what they want. PIF have plotted a careful, strategic path, empowering those on the ground at St James’ Park to make their vision a reality. At times the caution has frustrated those on Tyneside, with the interminable wait for concrete progress on the stadium and training ground seen as symbolic of a project that hasn’t been as bold as first hoped.

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Newcastle's Carabao Cup win belongs to the boyhood fan who refused to quit

So here’s some big news: PIF now believe they are ready to push into the next phase of the project. There will be a “significant” summer recruitment drive – a right winger has already been lined up – with a budget strengthened by the club’s profitability and sustainability rules (PSR) sacrifices of the last three windows.

Lloyd Kelly’s sale – seen as a significant deal negotiated by Paul Mitchell – has pushed them over the top on that front while also strengthening their resolve to keep hold of their best players.

Finalising stadium plans is in the works, too, although talk of it being done and dusted is premature. A new ground in Leazes Park could go to 70,000 seats and will be state-of-the-art, although there are those in the fanbase who think that isn’t enough for a club going places.

“The first but not the last,” Al-Rumayyan shouted to the massed banks of black and white-clad fans at Wembley as he held the Carabao Cup. Consider that in the background Newcastle are maintaining a “watching brief” on financial fair play rules that could yet be struck out. There is a sense inside the club that they are only just getting started.

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