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Captain Lascelles welcomes late point
Written by Tom Easterby
Newcastle United captain Jamaal Lascelles admitted his side were a little disappointed not to have built on their early lead against Norwich City on Tuesday night.
Ayoze Perez latched on to Jack Colback’s fine through ball to slot home the opener after just 24 seconds at Carrow Road.
But quickfire strikes from Jacob Murphy and Cameron Jerome turned the game on its head, giving the hosts a lead they held onto until the break despite plenty of pressure from Rafa Benitez’s men.
And that pressure eventually told ten minutes from time, when Lascelles volleyed in at the far post, meeting Perez’s cross to draw the Magpies level.
The 23-year-old, though, said that while that late point was one of the positives to take from the thrilling encounter in East Anglia, he believes United should never have been in a position where they had to battle back to restore parity.
“It was an excellent start. We moved the ball really well, and Ayoze’s a clever player; if he gets half a chance he normally puts it away, so it gave us a little lift,” he told nufc.co.uk.
“But after that, we’ve got to really switch on because I think that when we go a goal up, we’re really vulnerable. We need to sort that out and look at ourselves.
“I ask quite a lot of this team, and we shouldn’t even be in a situation where we’re trying to get a goal back. No team should be able to do that to us.
“I know it was from mistakes that we made, and we’re disappointed that we made errors. But on the other side, we’re pleased that we came away with something tonight.
“I just found myself in the right place at the right time (for the equaliser) – I’d rather it had been 0-0 than 2-2. We’ll just prepare for the next game now, and keep our heads up.”
Jerome’s goal just after the quarter hour mark turned the game on its head and put Alex Neil’s men in front.
The tap-in came as a result of an unfortunate error from goalkeeper Karl Darlow, but skipper Lascelles insists that the error “won’t affect” the former Nottingham Forest stopper, who has been in fine form between the sticks this term.
“He’s got high expectations of himself, he’s got really high standards, and we all do with each other,” he explained. “Mistakes happen all the time. Even Ronaldo, Messi, they all make mistakes, it happens to every single player. You can’t be amazing every single day.
“He’ll brush it off, it’s not going to affect him at all. But we all reacted well and managed to get a point, so we go again on Monday.”
“I ask quite a lot of this team, and we shouldn’t even be in a situation where we’re trying to get a goal back. No team should be able to do that to us."