Eddie Howe says past week has been 'challenging' for Newcastle United but finds positive outlook

Newcastle United are back in Premier League action on Monday night when they travel to West Ham for the 8pm kick-off live on Sky Sports.

A win on Monday night would go a long way to relieving the tension around the club right now after an awful week for Newcastle United.

Anthony Gordon's red card against Brighton on Sunday set the tone before Danny Welbeck grabbed an extra-time winner for the Seagulls, sending Newcastle out of the competition.

Lewis Hall was then ruled out for the season soon followed by Sven Botman being ruled out for eight weeks.

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Eddie Howe is still searching for the positives

That's three huge players who will now miss the game on Monday and perhaps more importantly, the Carabao Cup final next weekend. It's something Eddie Howe is trying desperately to put a positive spin on.

Speaking to the media on Friday morning, Howe called it a 'challenging' week for the club.

"It's not been the best of weeks, it's been one of those weeks that challenges you in the job that I'm in.

"But I think you always need a level head, you need clear thinking and you need to put it always into perspective, we still have a really strong squad, we still have a really strong team.

"We're gonna miss the players that we're gonna lose and that's a big disappointment - but it's always someone else's opportunity and we have to look at it that way.

"Those players I know will be supporting us and hopefully we can do really well."

Can Newcastle use the negativity as fuel for a fight?

It's definitely going to be an opportunity for a couple of players to step up, likely to be Harvey Barnes and Matt Targett, but will they have what it takes to stand up to West Ham and Liverpool?

Neither has played a great deal of football for a long time and that's our biggest concern.

We've been looking at this week as purely negative, but we're overlooking the fact that sometimes adversity can galvanise a team, so let's hope for that type of fight from the lads.