Newcastle held to third straight away draw at Bournemouth
BOURNEMOUTH, England :Newcastle United's away-day blues deepened on Sunday when Bournemouth held them to a third consecutive 0-0 draw on the road in a Premier League encounter that failed to spark into life.
Although Newcastle kept a third straight clean sheet on the road, they remain winless away from home this season, with their latest stalemate leaving Eddie Howe's side languishing in 13th place with just six points from five games.
Bournemouth, meanwhile, climbed provisionally to third on 10 points as Howe failed to beat his former side in the league once again in a winless run stretching to seven games, with his team not having a single shot on target in the second half.
"I haven't given it too much thought in terms of who deserves what. We know Bournemouth are a really good team. We limited them to long shots and Nick (Pope) made some good saves. We didn't get our attacking game going," Howe told BBC.
"It's not good. You want to create chances and clear cut chances. I didn't feel that in our performance. We are going through one of those phases where it's hard to score away from home."
Howe shuffled his pack with seven changes from the midweek Champions League loss to Barcelona, resting Bruno Guimaraes while also fielding a back three and deploying Nick Woltemade and Jacob Murphy up front.
Bournemouth started brightly, dominating possession in the opening stages and creating early chances. Both keepers were also forced into early saves while David Brooks had a goal for the home side ruled out for offside.
Woltemade continued to impress with his link-up play but failed to have a shot on goal as a promising start from both sides descended into a dull affair when injury stoppages disrupted the game's momentum.
PENALTY SHOUT
Newcastle had a penalty shout waved away in the second half, with a frustrated Woltemade pounding the turf with his fist after he felt he was fouled by Bafode Diakite when the defender tugged the German striker's shirt.
Howe's introduction of Anthony Elanga and Harvey Barnes nearly paid dividends when the latter danced through the defence and into the box, but James Hill stuck out his leg to give away a corner and deny the winger before he pulled the trigger.
Bournemouth were incensed when Malick Thiaw escaped a second booking for a foul on Ryan Christie just outside the box and the home side squandered the free-kick when the Scotland international dinked the ball over the wall and out of play.
The closest either side came to breaking the deadlock arrived in added time when Justin Kluivert unleashed a vicious free-kick that was on target, but Nick Pope got down low to palm it away and preserve his clean sheet.
"We have to value the point, we are playing against a Champions League club," Bournemouth boss Andoni Iraola said.
"I'm happy with the performance. The way we defended, we played in their half and we didn't concede many set pieces. The ones we did, we defended really well."
