Eddie Howe happy with Allan Saint-Maximin’s Newcastle injury return

EDDIE HOWE feels the return of Allan Saint-Maximin was a major positive to emerge from Newcastle United’s 2-0 defeat to Arsenal yesterday.

The Magpies suffered their first home defeat since mid-February as Martin Odegaard’s first-half strike for the Gunners was followed by a second-half own goal from Fabian Schar.

Saint-Maximin started the game on the substitutes’ bench, and ended a month-long injury lay-off when he came on to replace Joe Willock for the final 12 minutes of the game.

The Frenchman made a couple of trademark bursts down the left flank, and should now be able to complete a full week’s training to enable him to compete for a starting spot in next weekend’s game at Leeds United.

Howe said: “It was huge for us, and I thought Maxi did very well when he came on. We probably thought he had 15 minutes maximum in his legs after only two training sessions and a long period out. I was delighted with his contribution.”

While Newcastle lost out to an Arsenal side who have closed back to within a point of league leaders Manchester City, Howe was nevertheless pleased with most aspects of his players’ performance.

He said: “We felt lots of the performance was good, without it probably being our best of the season. There were loads of chances, it was just one of those days when it wouldn’t go in for us.

“I felt if we had scored at any stage during that game, even at 2-0 down, we were always very close to getting back into the game. So it was a game that slipped by for us.”