Guthrie says NUFC are ready for ‘new’ challenge

Jul 28 2009 by Stuart Rayner, The Journal

DANNY Guthrie does not believe a lack of Football League experience will count against Newcastle United when the new season kicks off a week on Saturday.

For most Magpies players, the match at West Bromwich Albion will be a new experience. Very few have played in the Championship before and experienced its unique physical demands.

But as one of five senior players who have previously played in the division – on loan at Southampton – Guthrie believes his team-mates have worked out for themselves what is required.

“Everyone knows it’s going to be a tough league, everyone’s just prepared to work hard and go out and win matches,” said the 22-year-old. “It’s the same as we would do in any other league. We know how difficult it’s going to be, but that’s why we’re having a tough pre-season, to be ready for it.”

Winger Damien Duff had a season playing in the division with Blackburn Rovers in 1999-2000, while Shola Ameobi, Andy Carroll and Kazenga LuaLua each made a handful of loan appearances there. Guthrie’s spell at Southampton amounted to just ten late-season games on loan from Liverpool in 2007, and the Telford-born midfielder does not attach a great deal of importance to them in preparing him for the coming

campaign. “I was at Southampton for a couple of months when I was 19, 20 but it’s a bit different starting from scratch in that league,” he said. “Everyone knows what we’ve got to do and hopefully we can get a good start and push for promotion.”

United should at least be eased gently into Football League life. They open their campaign with a televised game against the Baggies, another side who were playing Premier League football last season. Under previous manager Tony Mowbray they eschewed the physical, direct approach more prevalent outside of the top-flight and it seems unlikely the Saltburn-born boss’ replacement, Roberto Di Matteo, will take a radically different approach.

Newcastle have avoided Championship opposition in pre-season, but their performance against League One Leyton Orient hardly inspired optimism. Saturday’s 6-1 defeat was embarrassing for the 1,500 or so supporters who travelled to Brisbane Road, but the manner of the goals they conceded was of greater concern than their quantity.

Caretaker manager Chris Hughton has called for an improvement in tomorrow’s penultimate pre-season game – the Magpies’ first home match since relegation from the Premier League – against another League One side, Leeds United, which kicks off at 7.45pm.

Newcastle’s preparations have been massively hamstrung by the limbo they finds themselves in. For now at least it seems likely there will be a permanent manager appointed or any transfers in or out of the club until Mike Ashley finds a buyer for it.

Though few have been prepared to say so publicly, many United players are surely hoping to leave for the Premier League or foreign climes. But with time running out – the transfer window closes in 35 days – the side which lost so comprehensively at Leyton Orient could be more or less the one which lines up at the Hawthorns.

“Whoever’s here now we’ve got to presume they’ll be here at the start of the season,” said Guthrie. “It’s the only way we can think unless something changes, and that’s not in our hands.

“Everyone’s just concentrating on getting fit and ready for the first game of the season. As players that’s all we can do.”

Striker Obafemi Martins is the latest to be linked with a move away, with a German newspaper quoting him talking in glowing terms about Wolfsburg.

Martins’ agent claims the comments are not his client’s and, although the Bundesliga side are believed to be interested, they will have to wait for Ashley’s self-imposed transfer ban to be lifted.