Swansea "Offer A Benchmark" For Newcastle To Strive To Emulate, Believes Paul Simpson
Simpson thinks the Swans play a brilliant brand of football - and NUFC should replicate that.
Swansea City "offer a benchmark" of where Newcastle United want to be in both the way they play football and in their Barclays Premier League finishing position from last season, Paul Simpson believes. The Magpies assistant head coach admits he has been impressed with the "tremendous job" Garry Monk has done in developing Swansea and turning them into a "great footballing side". Interestingly, when Steve McClaren was appointed Newcastle boss it was stated that a top-eight finish was the goal and Simpson believes that Swansea - who were eight last season - are the sort of Premier League side the Magpies want to be aiming to emulate. 
"They (Swansea) do (offer a benchmark of where NUFC want to be). They had a fantastic season last year. "I think Garry Monk has done a tremendous job in his first managerial role. He seems to have taken (to) it like a duck to water and seems to be enjoying the responsibility. "He's got them playing some great football - looking at the videos in our preparation for the game. They play good football, they've got great individuals - the likes of (Jefferson) Montero, (Bafetimbi) Gomis, (Andre) Ayew, (Jonjo) Shelvey, they've got a whole host of players. "And they're a footballing side and we want to be a footballing side as well so it'll be a good test for us. It'll be a good test of our patience and discipline because there'll be periods of the game where they'll have the ball and we've got to keep our shape but we've got to make sure that we match the for that football."Both sides began their Premier League campaigns with 2-2 draws - Newcastle against Southampton, while Swansea impressively held Champions Chelsea at Stamford Bridge. And Simpson believes that the Magpies need to replicate the "workrate" they displayed against the Saints, but improve in the final third in order to come out on top in south Wales. He continued:
"We match them and we match the workrate we had against Southampton - the energy levels that we had against Southampton. "Try to improve a little bit in the final third with our delivery, our final balls and our shooting and if we can do that then I'm sure it'll be a very good game for people to watch - particularly for the neutral but hopefully for us in black and white we'll be coming away smiling from it."For all the latest NUFC News, Views and Transfers make sure to follow WhatCulture.com/NUFC on Twitter and Facebook.