Steve Bruce admits the narrative for Newcastle United’s season could be written in the next five days. The Magpies face Fulham knowing they could put an 11-point cushion between themselves and the third-bottom Cottagers while Tuesday night’s encounter with Brentford in the EFL Cup could mean that fans could be sitting down for Christmas dinner this year knowing their club are in their first semi-final for 15 years. Of course, the flip side could also be that Newcastle’s trophy woe continues for another year and Fulham cut down the gap in the top-flight meaning Newcastle will be nervously looking over their shoulder going into tough tests with 2019 Premier League champions Manchester City and then reigning title holders Liverpool.
Steve Bruce said “We’ve got two huge games coming up with this one and the cup tie on Tuesday. What an opportunity to get to 20 points by Christmas and be in the semi-final of the cup. It’s all to play for so let’s hope we can achieve it. When we equalised, I thought we gave ourselves a wonderful opportunity to win the match. When we’re chasing the game at 3-2 down with five to play, we can’t be as naive as we were. We scored twice away from home so we’re starting to look a threat. There’s no doubt the third one was a poor goal. We could have cleared it twice and we got caught in our own box. The fourth and fifth I can understand because we’re trying to chase the game and left ourselves exposed. It puts a different reflection on the game.”
