ESPN Brasil managed to grab a long interview with Newcastle United legend Alan Shearer this week.
During the chat, they asked him to analyse several Brazilian players, first asking him to name his favourite in the past or present. And the former striker went straight to one who plays in England.
“One that is in the Premier League now, I’m probably biased, because he plays in my position, but I’m a huge fan of Liverpool’s Firmino. I think he can do almost everything,” Alan Shearer told ESPN Brasil.
But Newcastle United fans probably want to know what Shearer thinks of Joelinton, who joined the club last summer in a €40m deal from Hoffenheim and has scored only one goal so far.
“There’s a lot of pressure on him. Not his fault, because what happened to Newcastle last year, when they got rid of Rondon, they got rid of Perez…
“Bringing him in for a lot of money, around about 40m. He had to hit the ground running, he had to score goals, almost straight away for Newcastle. Missed a big chance against Norwich, in their first away game. Had a very good chance in the first game against Arsenal, the keeper did well to save. He made that himself.
“But then getting the goal at Tottenham in the way he did, that was a wonderful touch, he finished off very very well. I think very much like Wesley at Aston Villa is that there’s going to be a lot of times with a lot of pressure on him to continue to score goals, because there’s not a lot of goals from the other players in that Newcastle team.
“What I’ve looked at, to begin with, I’ve liked. He’ll give Newcastle pace, works his socks off, I don’t think that’s an issue… but we’d love to see him score more goals. He’s got one, I’d love to see him score a few more.”
In several of his interviews this season, Joelinton has spoken about the pressure of taking the club’s No. 9 shirt. He’s claimed he didn’t know much about Alan Shearer before, but got to know his importance as soon as he arrived at the club.
Now Joelinton will probably watch Shearer’s this interview, and feel a greater need to score more goals.
