Under-fire Newcastle United manager Alan Pardew wants more goals from his midfielders to help kickstart the Magpies’ season.
The St James’ Park club have picked up just two points from their opening three Premier League fixtures and had failed to score before their 3-3 draw with Crystal Palace last time out.
Pardew – reportedly under pressure to produce a result against Southampton this weekend – has stressed the importance of goals from other areas of his team, with strikers Emmanuel Riviere and Ayoze Perez yet to register following their summer moves from Monaco and Tenerife.
“I feel that we’re a strong team, we have an outstanding midfield line that needs to contribute goals,” he said.
“Everybody keeps talking about our lack of strikers, but we need to get more goals from midfield and from our defenders.”
Summer signing Daryl Janmaat opened his account against Palace while Mike Williamson also found the net later in the game as Newcastle led 3-2 with a couple of minutes to go, but Pardew’s side failed to hold on.
The Magpies boss added: “The big bonus [against Palace] was Williamson scoring … his first goal in five years or whatever it was. There’s always small mercies.”
Newcastle are 4.66 to pick up their first win of the season at St Mary’s on Saturday with Southampton 1.75 in the 1×2 betting and the draw 3.52.
The match takes Pardew back to one of his former clubs and the scene of an embarrassing 4-0 defeat at the hands of the Saints in March.
A repeats of that scoreline is available to back at 33.0 in the Correct Score market.
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