Joe Willock struck twice when Newcastle came from behind to beat Birmingham City 3-2 in a pulsating FA Cup fourth round draw at St. Andrew's.
Eddie How's Many changed silk has closed a beautiful week thanks to the deceased winner of Willock, after he reached the Carabao Cup final on Wednesday with the victory over Arsenal.
Willock was abused on Instagram in the aftermath of the 2-1 defeat house of Newcastle in Fulham last weekend and Howe greeted his “strong willful” player for having his “football talking”.
League One -Leiders Birmingham pushed their Premier League visitors completely and took a shock in the first 40 seconds when Keshi Anderson was gone on a corner and the ball over the goal was for Ethan Laird to shoot.
Nick Pope produced a great save to push the volley from Anderson before Newcastle hit back. Bailey Peacock-Farrell seemed to have made a beautiful close-range save to keep Joe Willock out, but with goal line technology that is not in use in the FA Cup on land under the championship, the assistant referee was marked to indicate that The ball the ball was crossed the ball line.
And only five minutes later Newcastle led after William Osula managed to miss an open goal of two yards, unintentionally threw the ball behind him for Callum Wilson, who made his first start since May 2024 to put home and the blush of his teammate to save.
Willock had correctly excluded a third for offside before Birmingham's Dangerman Stansfield led a good chance from close by.
But the hosts were leveled in style when IWATA hammered an unstoppable drive in the top corner of the edge of the box to close a wonderful half of action.
The second period could not meet the standards of the first, because the draw was scrappy with Blues midfielder Marc Leonard, taken off a stretcher after he slid on Lewis Miley while Newcastle Center-back Dan Burn Limde.
Newcastle threw the pressure on the way to the final phase and eventually it told Willock from a corner through the legs of Peacock-Farrell to send the visitors.
Willock: It has not been an easy season for me
Newcastle -midfielder Joe Willock told the BBC:
“I just tried to give my best. It has not been an easy season for me, I waited for my chance to continue and hopefully this is the start of the rest of my season.
“They are very exciting times. It is not an easy place to come, but we want to thank the fans. Hopefully we can go a better one this time in the Carabao Cup [final] And far in this competition. “
Newcastle Manager Eddie Howe:
“I think Joe treated himself really well this week. His reaction to what he suffered (abuse of social media) was really admirable, real willpower.
“He loves his football and I think he just focused on that and tried to leave all other distractions behind. He let his football talk.
“Really satisfied for him because he is such a talented boy. You want to see Joe at his best, it has been a stop-starting season for him, but today I think a big moment is.”
How: injuries are the last thing we need
Newcastle -Manager Howe told the BBC:
“It was a difficult game for us. Mentally, physically – you could see that a few players were about to do today. We are delighted to get through.
“I thought it would be a difficult evening before the competition. [The early goal] It made it double difficult because the atmosphere in the stadium completely changed. We managed to get a foothold and did really well. During the break it was about staying calm. I thought we did that much better in the second half. “
In the event of injuries: “In the past few weeks we seem to have picked up a few. It would be the latter [we need] To derail. We have such a small team. Last season we had a large numbers of players and it disturbed us in the middle of the season.
“We were forced to take burns. It was something with his groin. Fingers crossed, it's not so bad.”
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