Cuti Romero produced a ‘wow’ moment for Thomas Frank, who spoke about his captain’s ‘textbook striker’s goal’, Guglielmo Vicario’s character and the support of our travelling fans after our resilient 2-2 draw against Newcastle United at St. James’ Park on Tuesday night.
The team displayed all the traits Thomas was looking for after a tough week – defeats against PSG, Arsenal and Fulham – and then had to dig deep, twice, to secure a point against a side that had racked up six wins on the trot in the Toon.
Bruno Guimaraes broke the deadlock on 71 minutes, but Cuti responded with a brilliant diving header from Mo Kudus’ cross to level seven minutes later. Anthony Gordon fired Newcastle back in front from the spot after a VAR penalty call with four minutes left but we picked ourselves up again and, in the fifth of nine minutes of added time, Cuti produced his moment, an overhead kick after Aaron Ramsdale punched Mathys Tel’s corner skywards.
“Cuti today, wow, what a performance overall – aggressive defensively, good on the ball, and of course, tops it off with two goals,” said Thomas. “The first, the header, exceptional, that's a striker’s goal, a textbook striker’s goal, and the bicycle kick, wow, perfect and perfect contact with the shin as well, bottom corner, so well done to Cuti.”
At the other end, Vic was assured all night and produced big saves when they mattered to deny Gordon, Lewis Miley and most notably, a superb reaction save down to his left to turn away Tino Livramento’s piledriver through a crowd of players following a corner.
Thomas added: “I must say, normally you really can judge a character by how the person is dealing with a setback, because that shows resilience, and that shows that you've got some inner core that is very strong and can come back, so I think he was very good today.
“I must also say, others that were very good today were our fans, wow, travelling with more than 3,000 on a Tuesday night, long travel, and you could hear them through the game, and it's difficult, by the way, to be an away fan here and be heard because they're loud, so the way we could hear them, the support, and I heard them singing to Vic, that made me extremely proud and happy, and I think that's the togetherness we need from everyone.”