Allan Saint-Maximin has been ordered to get revved up and deliver the same “physical effort” as his Newcastle team mates this season - and improve how he parks his Ferrari!
The enigmatic French winger was sent away on holiday this summer with instructions to hit new levels by boss Eddie Howe. The United coach rates him as the best in the world 1v1. Saint-Maximin is Newcastle’s game changer and Howe insists he is “happy” despite speculation he could leave this summer if Newcastle got a bid of £40m plus.
Spurs were interested at half that price and Newcastle are keeping him and trying to add to their attacking options, with Leeds’ Jack Harrison a target. Scoring goals could be the Geordies’s biggest problem in the coming season with just 44 netted in 38 league games last term.
Howe says United coaches have worked hard on Saint-Maximin to get a bigger output in all areas of the game, including defensively. “He's devastating when he's one v one,” Howe said. “I wouldn't say there's a better player one v one from an attacking perspective than Maxi in world football. So we need to get the ball in better areas. But I think the expectation of Maxi is that he's got to be able to deliver the physical effort that I want the team to deliver. So there's been a lot of individual work towards that. And yeah, I'm expecting a great season from him."
"Well, we've worked really hard with Maxi during pre-season. He's in a really good place, I think. He looks happy. He's trained well. He's delivered everything that we've asked him to deliver. You know, we've pushed him physically. He's responded. So I'm hoping for a very, very good season. I think my big message to him at the end of last season was, physically, we need to try and get more. And that's in every area of his game; so that's more forward runs, getting in more goal scoring positions.
“He picked up a very minor ankle injury in Austria, which set him back a couple of days and he didn't train for a couple days before the last game (against 1860 Munich. But he's back and he's now had a bit more training.”
Saint-Maximin, scorer of eleven goals in three seasons, is also going to have to improve his parking habits at the training ground this season. Towards the end of last season he started to park his £150,000 black Ferrari directly outside the training ground entrance, marked out of bounds, and squeezed between the special bays reserved for the captain and manager.
A notice then appeared ordering players not to block the entrance, but the sports car was still slotted into the space. Asked if 25-year-old’s parking skills had become a problem, Howe said: "That's something that we will be addressing with him."
