Southampton boss hails 'incredible' thing Newcastle United star did - Alan Shearer agrees
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The Newcastle United star scored twice in the first half, cancelling out Jan Bednarek’s 10th-minute opener, to take his goalscoring to 19 in all competitions this campaign.
Isak levelled from the penalty that he won after being brought down by Joe Aribo. Referee Sam Barrott initially waved away the Magpies’ appeals but changed his decision after reviewing the incident at the VAR pitchside monitor.
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Hide AdThe Swede’s second goal came moments later. Receiving a pass by Jacob Murphy, Isak’s exquisite first touch took him past the Southampton defender before slotting the ball into the bottom right corner.
It was a goal Juric believes his players could do little about after hailing Isak’s quality.
The Croatian told reporters: "We have to say the second goal is the technical quality of the Newcastle player, incredible. Sometimes you have to accept this. The pass, control and shot are really high quality."
Newcastle legend Alan Shearer also highlighted Isak’s skill. Posting on X, Shearer said: “Oh man that touch and finish from Isak #SOUNEW“
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Hide AdIsak now has 48 Premier League goals for the Magpies, 100 behind record holder Shearer, on 148 top flight strikes in black and white.
Speaking about Isak after the game, Howe said: “Yeah, I think with Alex that we try to get a balance between information and freedom. I think he's so creative naturally that I think putting too many restrictions on his game in terms of where he moves would be a negative.
“Certainly we've given him a lot of structure on the out of possession. That would be very clear. We certainly won't be leaving that to chance. That is a directive that he has to follow, and he's done it really well this year. But certainly with the ball, yes, we have a certain way that we play and what we ask him to do, but there is an element of freedom with that as well.
“I think naturally the goals have started to come. I think there was no doubting his ability. When I saw him play at Sociedad, the last season there, he didn't score a huge amount of goals. But I could see in his general play that he was an outstanding footballer. So the only question really was, could he score again? Because he'd scored a lot the previous season. And I think pretty much since day one, he's been a regular scorer for us.
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Hide Ad“And that's no doubt helped his self-belief. His general confidence when he enters the pitch seems really high at the moment, and that's not a given. You have to earn that through your training. He's been outstanding this year, but I think the challenge for him is to continue to get better.”
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