After a week of scrutiny for a performance on the pitch, Eddie Howe was back to his best off it.
During a 30-minute media briefing on Friday, the Newcastle head coach was calm, clever and calculated. Give him a blank bit of paper, he said in reply to a Mail Sport question about not knowing his best team, and he could write down the 11 names. The problem, he said, was that those stars are not shining on grass. It was a warning, you felt, to the likes of Bruno Guimaraes, Joelinton and Anthony Gordon.