The Wembley arch lit up the night sky, but it offered little comfort to Newcastle United players and staff in the darkness of defeat. The iconic structure, after all, had long turned red to mark Manchester United's Carabao Cup final win by the time the Newcastle team bus pulled away following the Magpies' 2-0 loss.
Those on board did not have far to go, at least. Family and friends were waiting at the nearby Hilton to lift spirits, but Eddie Howe only spent a few minutes in the ballroom. The Newcastle boss had questions he needed answering.
"There was a lot of disappointment and I just wanted to watch the game again," he told ChronicleLive. "There was a line drawn at that moment. The cup final hype that was there for weeks and weeks and weeks probably affected us. It was nice to go, 'Right. Let's get back to the Premier League.'"
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If ever an anecdote summed up the 'relentless pursuit of better' slogan that drives Howe every day. Newcastle certainly got back to the Premier League, all right.
Rather than the season fizzling out, following that painful February evening, third-placed Newcastle have gone on to return to Europe's top table for the first time in 20 years. To think the first Champions League game Howe will ever attend will be a group stage fixture he is managing in. Not even the Newcastle head coach could have imagined that at the start of the campaign.
Yet neither the players nor the staff were consumed by targets when the season kicked off. While the coaching team, privately, set about consolidating and improving a number of key markers that Newcastle had previously underperformed in, there was quiet talk of doing 'something special' among the senior players. A top four finish was beyond even their wildest dreams last summer yet the group only grew in belief as the campaign progressed. Instead of being burdened by the pressure of qualifying for the Champions League, and wasting energy obsessing over resurgent Liverpool's results, the squad simply relished the chance to create their own bit of history.
The backroom team and the dressing room's leadership group, made up of Kieran Trippier, Jamaal Lascelles, Dan Burn, Callum Wilson and Matt Ritchie, ensured nothing changed as they neared the finish line. It was all about focusing on themselves - the next game, the 'process' and getting the team right.
The staff even kept it light when pressure from outside the region was ramping up. Ahead of last week's huge game against Brighton, for instance, bakers from Toast in Tynemouth were invited into the training ground to surprise the players with pastries following an intense morning session.
Away from the canteen, the measured Howe kept things 'very simple and clear' as Newcastle got closer, refusing to overreact on the rare occasions the black-and-whites did not win a game, whether it was a 3-0 defeat at Aston Villa, a 2-0 loss against Arsenal or a 2-2 draw at Leeds United. There was no changing tack during the run-in to ensure the players' heads were clear when it mattered most and Newcastle duly sealed Champions League qualification with a goalless stalemate against Leicester City on Monday night.
Dan Burn was the first to admit that 'we never thought we would be here', but this tight-knit group have 'fought for each other' and relished being in uncharted territory.
"It's not a fluke that we are where we are," the defender told ChronicleLive. "We are so consistent in what we do. We're not afraid of anyone in this league. We will come after you and if you can play through and beat us then so be it, but we're not going to sit off you and give you that time to settle."
The numbers tell their own story in that regard. A team that once sat back now lead the way in high-intensity running and sprints. When it comes to passes per defensive action (10.3), which measures pressing intensity; pressed sequences (578); and high turnovers (323), Newcastle's numbers are among the very best in the Premier League.
Central to that shift in style was a brutal pre-season, Howe's first in charge, where the Newcastle boss and his staff were able to plant the seeds to turn a side that once relied on transitions and the counter-attack into a relentless outfit that play on the front foot and press high up the pitch. It says it all that Newcastle have only got fitter as the campaign has progressed. As a rival Premier League executive told ChronicleLive: "They're physically powerful - a very tough team to play against."
The club, in short, have status again - on and off the field. When the Nad Al Sheba complex, for example, did not have the staffing capacity to look after Newcastle for a warm-weather training camp in Dubai back in March, because the staff were already booked in to cater for a Ramadan tournament in the evenings, Howe's team were instead able to train at the in-demand Police Officers' Club Stadium. This is where Champions League semi-finalists AC Milan were put through their paces only a few months earlier.
These biannual warm-weather training camps reflect the backing the staff can count on behind the scenes and it is not just the physical facility at the club's modernised Benton base that has taken shape in the last 12 months. Newcastle were finally able to bring in a full-time nutritionist, Andreas Kasper, last summer, and the club's chefs now have access to locally sourced meat, fish, vegetables and bread. Players benefit from cryotherapy sessions on site, which help curb fatigue, inflammation and soft tissue injuries, and they no longer have to queue up for treatments like they once did in the Ashley era with a number of new physios on site and an expanded treatment room to boot. These one per cents all add up.
Most importantly, in the transfer market, the owners' support enabled Newcastle to sign Nick Pope, Sven Botman and Alexander Isak last summer, who have all helped take this side to the next level. Assistant Graeme Jones has seen that first-hand.
"With a little bit of sugar on the cake, we recruited some good players and, without money, you can't do that," he told ChronicleLive. "The owners have supported us in everything we have tried to do. They know that we have done it realistically, we have done it honestly and we have done it in detail. It's a mixture of all those things why we are where we are today but, without a shadow of a doubt, the main person behind that is Eddie because his energy levels are incredible."
To illustrate that final point, it is worth noting that half of the individuals who featured against Leicester City on Monday night were players Howe inherited and subsequently took to new heights. These were characters who were willing and committed, who 'did not allow any blame culture' to take hold despite relegation-threatened Newcastle's plight when Howe was appointed, and that gave the Magpies boss a foundation to work with.
Howe set about creating a working environment and strong culture to build on that team spirit. The huge winning team photographs that now adorn the walls of the corridors in the training ground are a visible reminder of the progress Newcastle have made, but these pictures have only driven this group on to make more memories. Such is the culture now, a number of players will park up at the training ground even on their days off. The phrase 'never miss a day's training' has new meaning as Fabian Schar explained.
"Our game is quite intense so you have to do this in training," the centre-back told ChronicleLive. "The start of the week, especially, is pretty intense. A lot of intensity exercises will be the same in the game. It's easy to say, but the way you train is the way you play. Everything we want to do in the game we do in training. That pays off.
"All the information we get - all the preparation and the detail - is very important and helps us win games. Small details are very important. When you feel you are well-prepared for a game, you have a good feeling going into it."
Schar and co will certainly have a good feeling going into the final match of this remarkable campaign against Chelsea on Sunday. They are now playing for a Champions League club.
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