I don't fear fixture pile-up - Hughton

Jan 11 2010 by Stuart Rayner, The Journal

Geremi’s departure was announced last week, only for it to emerge that Turkish club Ankaragucu had jumped the gun in unveiling a signing they had not completed.

The Cameroon midfielder’s presence at the Africa Cup of Nations will only slow the process.

The weather which decimated the weekend’s sporting calendar has brought some benefits, however.

Hughton saw the positives of time out from a hectic schedule after three consecutive draws slowed Newcastle’s momentum.

And his own side’s inactivity allowed him to watch some of their rivals.

Hughton was at Nottingham Forest’s win at West Brom and took in yesterday’s Leicester City v Ipswich Town game.

He had also planned to be at a Saturday match, only for it – and his second choice – to be called off.

“If I look at whether we would have prefered to play the games, I would say yes,” Hughton argued. “At the moment we’re reasonably well placed in terms of injuries – Joey Barton is the only player we’ve got out.

“But it’s a little bit of a break and if we win our games afterwards it will have worked quite well for us. There’s never any harm in recharging the batteries.

“It’s been a tough season so far, so in some ways it’s a little bit of a break from the normal training.

“You can go through periods where the extra game falls nicely into place so you have plenty of time for preparation, or it can land awkwardly.

“What we do know is Wednesday’s is a game we desperately want on. If it was to be postponed, that would give us problems.

“But everybody will have games backed up. The majority of games have been off, so nobody has a big advantage.

“There are other replays this week, including Forest against Birmingham, so they could have the same problem.”