Wednesday night saw Sandro Tonali given the task of playing in the centre of the midfield three with Bruno Guimaraes on the bench as Newcastle United faced Chelsea.
Newcastle fans have been waiting to see Sandro Tonali given that more central role for a while and when it finally happened on Wednesday we saw the Italy international have his best game for the club since his Premier League debut last season.
This now poses a huge problem for Eddie Howe as it would appear that he's found Tonali's best position, but it happens to be the one occupied by his new team captain Bruno Guimaraes.
There has been a debate since Sandro Tonali signed for Newcastle as to whether Bruno and Tonali can play together or are they too similar? It's a question that is still yet to be answered.
Eddie Howe gave himself a lot of problems on Wednesday as the changes he made in terms of personnel and the way the team was set up all worked really well, so now he has to work out how to set up going forward.
In his pre-match press conference ahead of Saturday's game against Arsenal, Eddie Howe was asked who will be playing central now that Tonali did so well on Wednesday (via The Chronicle).
"Sandro can definitely play both positions [centre-mid and right-sided mid], whether it be higher or lower and that's why we recruited him in a way because he had that versatility. We didn't want to sign one player for one position.
"I think Bruno is slightly more complex in terms of where he plays, because I think he has natural strengths, where he gravitates to the ball and always wants to be on the ball, and that's his biggest strength.
"So playing him away from the ball is different for him - so that's something to look at."
That was a lot of words to say "I don't really know" but we get it, it's a huge call to make with two huge stars who you don't want to upset.
We're sure that it will click one day and when it does, the Premier League needs to look out as our midfield, on paper, is immense, it just needs to translate on the pitch.
We can't wait to see how the team lines up on Saturday. We're probably more looking forward to seeing if Howe has learned anything from Wednesday more than we are the actual game.
PL | GD | PTS | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
1 |
Liverpool
|
14 | 18 | 35 |
2 |
Chelsea
|
15 | 17 | 31 |
3 |
Arsenal
|
15 | 14 | 29 |
4 |
Manchester City
|
15 | 6 | 27 |
5 |
Nottingham Forest
|
15 | 1 | 25 |
6 |
Aston Villa
|
15 | 0 | 25 |
7 |
Brighton
|
15 | 3 | 24 |
8 |
Bournemouth
|
15 | 3 | 24 |
9 |
Brentford
|
15 | 3 | 23 |
10 |
Fulham
|
15 | 2 | 23 |
11 |
Tottenham Hotspur
|
15 | 12 | 20 |
12 |
Newcastle United
|
15 | -2 | 20 |
13 |
Manchester United
|
15 | 1 | 19 |
14 |
West Ham United
|
15 | -8 | 18 |
15 |
Everton
|
14 | -7 | 14 |
16 |
Leicester
|
15 | -9 | 14 |
17 |
Crystal Palace
|
15 | -6 | 13 |
18 |
Ipswich
|
15 | -13 | 9 |
19 |
Wolves
|
15 | -15 | 9 |
20 |
Southampton
|
15 | -20 | 5 |