No it is not! See Newcastle from 15 months ago.
It's a good point and a useful reminder of the size of the job Newcastle have to stick around. They spend the next month touring the 8-15 bracket, which is where they'll need to make their hay.
Newcastle did what teams do when they think there is a big talent gap and they're playing on the road. They did everything to slow the game down and waste time, packed their half defensively, and fouled relentlessly. I was a bit surprised they did it only because of how well they had been doing, but we know the gap offensively is pretty big right now, so I wasn't totally surprised either. It was the classic "hard fought draw" against a top of the table team. I can't get too mad about that, every team does it at some point, or should be able to. But the ref let the game get away from him a few times, made some too aggressive calls to try to get back in control, and then let some much, much worse things go at other moments. I was much more concerned about players getting injured than having a bad result.
We know Newcastle is there defensively, but they definitely need to add to the attack. I know there is talk of FFP or the EPL rules limiting what they can spend in the next few windows, but teams with money to spend always seem to figure out ways around that. It will be interesting to see who they bring in this window to make sure they get a Champions league slot.
