Eddie Howe's Newcastle have never had a problem scoring goals… until now

“Goals always change perceptions of performances.”

Eddie Howe’s assessment was accurate. Newcastle United may have been “dominant”, “looked our best all season”, and been left cursing Alexander Isak’s most wasteful outing in a black-and-white-striped shirt, but it was Brighton & Hove Albion who actually scored.

One-off undeserved defeats are inevitable, but underlying attacking issues that have afflicted Newcastle this season risk becoming concerning trends.

Scoring goals was never a problem for Howe’s Newcastle during his first two full seasons, yet in 2024-25 so far, failing to score regularly has been a consistent shortcoming.

After eight games, Newcastle have scored only eight goals, the sixth-fewest in the Premier League (as of Saturday night), and they have failed to score from open play in 404 minutes across all competitions.

Six goals came in their opening four matches; as the goals have dried up, so too have the points. After three victories and a draw, Newcastle have failed to win any of their last four, losing twice. Newcastle’s longest scoring run at St James’ Park since 1996 (22 straight matches) is gone, as is their 11-match unbeaten run at home.

Perversely, positive performances and positive results are not aligning. Newcastle had the latter without the former; now they have the former without the latter.

Against Brighton, Newcastle had 45 touches in the opposition box, 21 shots, six on target, played 40 passes into the area and created four “big chances” (which is defined by Opta as a situation when a player should be expected to score). All represented campaign highs and contributed to a season-best non-penalty expected goals (xG) return of 2.02.

But, having been excellent for 35 minutes, Newcastle conceded what Howe described as a “poor goal” — from Brighton’s first entry into the box and first shot. Although the home team still had 13 shots and an xG of 1.18 during the second half, their display became increasingly disjointed.

“At the start of the season, we probably didn’t play well but picked up points,” Dan Burn said. “Now, we’ve played well and haven’t. So I think you can’t have everything, if you know what I mean?”

But Newcastle have had “everything” under Howe before and they need to reconnect positive performances and positive results to reignite their push for European qualification.

The attacking display against Brighton (finishing aside) felt like a start because, across every key metric, Newcastle have been underperforming compared to the past two seasons.

Per 90, Newcastle’s figures are significantly down for goals (from 2 to 1), non-penalty xG (1.82 to 1.36), shots (14.8 to 12.8), efforts on target (5.4 to 4.1) and “big chances” (3.3 to 2.1). While they previously ranked in the top six for most offensive indicators, they are now in the bottom half.

From scoring 1.6 open-play goals per match last season, Newcastle have only managed 0.8 per game in 2024-25.

“That’s not a good stat and we’re well aware of that,” Howe said of Newcastle’s dearth of goals. “I don’t sense that becoming an issue. We played a couple of those games without a striker. Against Brighton, we didn’t look like a team that won’t score goals. We created chances when we haven’t in previous games.”

Howe’s appraisal of earlier matches is fair. Newcastle have only produced more than two “big chances” in two games: Bournemouth (four) and Brighton (four).

The failure to bolster the right-wing berth during the summer remains damaging, with little threat coming down that flank. Jacob Murphy has started six matches, despite not entirely convincing, while Harvey Barnes and Anthony Gordon are best suited to the left. William Osula being recruited ahead of a senior centre-forward also meant Howe did not field an out-and-out striker against Manchester City or Everton due to Isak and Callum Wilson’s respective injuries.

“There were attacking areas that we were looking to strengthen,” Howe admitted. “But we didn’t end up achieving success in those positions.”

Ironically, creativity was not Newcastle’s problem against Brighton, even if final-third decision-making remains questionable — it was their finishing.

Gordon and Joelinton had opportunities, while Isak had four shots on target and an xG of 0.81, the first time he has had more than two attempts on target and failed to score for Newcastle. The last Newcastle striker to have had four or more efforts on target without scoring was Joselu in September 2017.

Isak was deprived of service before his toe injury, but his uncharacteristic wastefulness cost his side against Brighton.

“Alex must be kind of disappointed,” said Burn. “It’s brilliant he’s had such a lot of chances — I’d be more worried if he wasn’t getting those. It’s kind of a story of the season.”

Not only have Newcastle been creating fewer clear opportunities, they have become more profligate this season. Their shot-conversion rate (13.6 per cent to 7.8 per cent), shooting accuracy (51.3 per cent to 47.8 per cent) and big-chance conversion success (43.7 per cent to 29.4 per cent) have all dropped.

Only Barnes (three) and Gordon (two) have scored more than once, while Isak, Fabian Schar and Joelinton are the only others to have found the back of the net.

Strangely, Newcastle have also become slow starters, goals-wise. They have yet to score in the opening half-hour of any league game this season. While replacements rescued Newcastle early in the campaign — 38 per cent of their goals have come during the final 15 minutes — the substitutions against Brighton actually negatively disrupted their rhythm.

With Wilson close to returning and Isak sure to improve, dressing-room insiders are adamant the goals will come. Had Howe been able to withdraw a misfiring Isak and replace him with Wilson, Newcastle may have found a solution against Brighton.

The pessimistic appraisal is that Newcastle’s offensive issues are in danger of becoming entrenched. The optimistic outlook is that, rather than fail to threaten, Newcastle merely did not take their chances and, with their strikers returning to fitness, the expectation must be that goals will follow.

Howe’s verdict? “If we were 2-0 up after 35 minutes, you’d go, ‘That was one of the best performances in a long time’.”

That seems fair, except Newcastle did not score and did not win. Goals have never been an issue under Howe before — he cannot afford for them to become a longer-term problem now.

(Top photo: Matt McNulty/Getty Images)