Aston Villa 1, Newcastle United 0
May 25 2009 by Mark Douglas, The Journal
THE tombstone marking the death of Newcastle United's 16-year top-flight existence will read: "Architects of their own demise".
After a season in which the club has shot itself in the foot with reckless and wilful abandon, it was grimly appropriate that the final indignity of this pitiful season was self-inflicted.
Gareth Barry’s 38th-minute shot was careering harmlessly wide of Steve Harper’s goal when it collided with Damien Duff’s right boot, took a wicked deflection and spun beyond the fingers of United’s despairing goalkeeper.
It was a slice of dreadful misfortune, but don’t let anyone connected with this epic failure try and tell you that Newcastle United have been unlucky this season.
The club – unlike its magnificent supporters, who sang in defiance at the conclusion rather than weeping in self-pity – has deserved its fate.
Poor for the vast majority of the miserable 37 games that had preceded ‘Survival Sunday’, United were hopeless again when it came to number 38 – the handsomely-rewarded and much-heralded players wilting in the glaring West Midlands sun.
The fact that they surrendered again without much of a fight while results at Hull and Sunderland went their way is typical of the way that Newcastle have performed this season.
For the first 18 minutes of the game there were flashes of hope and inspiration, hints that salvation could be achieved.
Duff cut inside and flashed a shot past Brad Friedel’s post within the first ten minutes; Peter Lovenkrands saw his low drive cleared off the line by Carlos Cuellar and Obafemi Martins mustered his one moment of class with a thunderous volley that whizzed narrowly over the crossbar within the first quarter of an hour.
But it was no more than a cruel mirage. An out-of-form Aston Villa, never moving out of third gear, still had far too much for their hapless visitors, slowly assuming a dominance that they never surrendered.
The problems that emerged were the same ones that had hamstrung United all season. A makeshift defence, anchored by the dreadful Fabricio Coloccini, was pulled all over the pitch by Villa’s energetic and adventurous forwards. A forward line that couldn’t prosper on scraps, and missed the few gilt-edged chances that came their way.
And then – perhaps the biggest problem of all – a pedestrian and one-paced midfield that created nothing and was dominated from pretty much the first minute to the last.
