Simon Jordan slams ‘ridiculous’ & ‘destructive’ Newcastle United speculation with Liverpool claim

Newcastle were handed a difficult start to the Premier League season after finishing fourth and securing Champions Leaguefootball in 2022-23, Howe’s first full season in charge at the club.

Despite beating Aston Villa 5-1 on the opening day of the season, Newcastle were beaten 1-0 by Manchester City, 2-1 by 10-man Liverpool and 3-1 by Brighton & Hove Albion. The Magpies lost just five league games last season but had already lost three within a month of the new season getting under way.

Ahead of Newcastle’s return to Premier League action against Brentford on Saturday, reports emerged claiming club chairman Yasir Al-Rumayyan has given Eddie Howe his full backing.

But former Crystal Palace chairman Jordan was quick to hit back at the reports for spinning a negative narrative that Howe’s job is under any sort of threat.

“So what? Is that what we’ve come down to, really?” Jordan exclaimed on talkSPORT with Jim White. “Eddie Howe has done a really good job for 18 months, he’s had a slight bump in the road and all of a sudden we’re building up some particular narrative that his job is under threat.

“It would be ridiculous to assume it’s not [safe]!

“No one has given any indication that Newcastle are in any shape or form dissatisfied with Eddie Howe.”

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Newcastle are preparing to return to the Champions League for the first time in over 20 years on Tuesday night as they face AC Milan at the San Siro.

When reflecting on recent results, Jordan felt it was the late collapse against Liverpool at St James’ Park which was Newcastle’s ‘stand out’ bad result opposed to the 3-1 defeat at Brighton the following game.

“Everything is pretty rosy in the garden beside a couple of bad results with one of them in particular standing out which was ultimately the Liverpool game where they were 1-0 up and Liverpool down to 10 men,” Jordan added.

“There is very little wrong with Newcastle. I always said at the beginning of the season that it was going to be remarkably difficult for Newcastle to match what they did last year.

“They’ve got sensible ownership in there and you can see that it’s moderately sensible because despite people’s expectations, whilst they’ve spent a lot of money, if you look at what they’ve done previously, [Steve] Bruce got £100million over two seasons, this guy [Howe] has had £300million so the scale of what Newcastle are prepared to do is significantly greater hence the outcomes on the pitch are significantly greater.

“It’s a silly conversation, an unnecessary conversation, I think it’s a destructive conversation because Eddie Howe doesn’t go from someone who everyone was waxing lyrical about when they opened the season smashing Aston Villa 5-1 to a couple of bad results and all of a sudden the narrative is starting to be pedalled. It needs to be stopped.”