The Magpies drew another blank in front of goal away from home on Sunday afternoon in their 0-0 draw with Wolves

Newcastle United’s manager Eddie Howe looking bewildered after the 0-0 draw at Wolves(Image: 2026 CameraSport)

It felt as if Newcastle could have carried on playing for another four or five hours at Molineux and they still wouldn’t have broken the deadlock in their 0-0 draw with Wolverhampton Wanderers.

It was a similar feeling leaving Old Trafford last month as Newcastle were beaten 1-0 by Manchester United. Both games saw Newcastle dominate possession, largely control the game, but create very little in the way of clear-cut chances.

It has been a theme all season. Newcastle either create plenty of big chances and don’t take them or struggle to create them against teams defending in a low block.

For head coach Eddie Howe it was an all too familiar post match press conference as he faced up to probing questions about a blunt Magpies display in the West Midlands.

“We needed to do more in attack,” Howe conceded.

“Defensively, we were very good. We minimised their threat in transition and that was going to be their main source with how they played. They dropped off low and defended with numbers, protected their goal well but still I expect us to do better and create more.

“I thought we attacked better the longer the game went on. I thought our substitutions helped. I thought there were some good openings towards the end and it was a frustrating day.

“There was a bit of fatigue in the Manchester City performance after Bournemouth but today I thought physically we looked okay. It was more to do with the fact they defended very low, minimised space and the expectation was on us to always create against a low block of 10 players and we need to do it better.

“It is tough to do at times but I thought we put some really good balls in the box. Too many balls going across the face of their goal with not enough black and white shirts in the box and that is a frustration for us.

“I was generally happy with the attitude, the endeavour, but the quality was missing. In a game like that you are looking for one moment, a bit of individual brilliance or a set play and all the way through I thought it would come but it wasn’t to be.”

It was against Wolves that Nick Woltemade announced himself to the Premier League in style back on his debut in September and the German forward was given the nod above Yoane Wissa.

After his £69million club record move from Stuttgart was confirmed back in August, Woltemade had to wait 15 days to make his Magpies bow and he scored the only goal in the game as they ran out 1-0 winners over Wolves.

Woltemade thundered home a header from Jacob Murphy’s cross that day and that kicked off an inspired start to life on Tyneside.

But the confidence he displayed that day looks to be in very short supply right now and he snatched at a couple of similar headed chances in the first half

The Germany international forward has nine goals to his name this term and just over the halfway point of his first season in English football that record is not to be sniffed at.

But he is now seven games without a goal and his replacement, Wissa, didn’t offer much more from the bench.

He couldn’t stretch far enough to get on the end of a Harvey Barnes cross and he, too, hasn’t scored since the turn of the year.

That is a problem for Newcastle, particularly given they spent a combined £124million to bring the two strikers to the club in the summer transfer window.

Club record goalscorer Alan Shearer knows a thing or two about playing up front for Newcastle and he bemoaned the lack of Newcastle players attacking crosses that were being put into the penalty area.

He described United as ‘miles off it’ in forward positions. The problem is, whether it’s addressing the lack of creativity in games like today, or adding more firepower to the forward ranks, Howe has now confirmed Newcastle don’t have the ability to do anything about it in the transfer market.

When asked if Newcastle had the wherewithal to try and solve it in the transfer market, Howe bluntly replied: “I don’t think we have the financial ability to do that.”

With a glut of huge, and difficult, games on the horizon across all four competitions, it is something Newcastle need to get a hold of and improve quickly.

If you don’t score goals, you don’t win games, and Newcastle’s window of opportunity to collect those wins is narrowing with each passing match.