Alan Shearer reacts to Dan Burn’s message as Newcastle forced into key change to starting XI vs Bournemouth
Alan Shearer is among those who have reacted to a message from Dan Burn about the Champions League after Newcastle’s slim loss to Barcelona on their return to the competition.
Champions League nights at St James’ Park were back in style on Thursday (18 September) after a 2024-25 season without any European football as Barcelona made the trip to north-east England.
Newcastle took the game to Barcelona in the first-half on Tyneside with great intensity and grit that was reminiscent of the way they played in their 4-1 thrashing of PSG two seasons ago.
Marcus Rashford soon silenced St James’ Park with a brilliant brace to grab his first goals for the club, and Anthony Gordon did pull one back late on, but Eddie Howe‘s side could not do enough late on and lost the game 2-1.
Magpies stalwart Dan Burn played a full 90 minutes at centre-back and hardly put a foot wrong all evening, and he has now released a message detailing his pride to be back in UEFA’s premier club competition with his boyhood side.
Alan Shearer reacts as Dan Burn shows his love for Newcastle’s Champions League nights on home turf
Burn has built a great rapport with Newcastle fans over the last few years, with cult-hero status achieved after he netted the opener in their Carabao Cup triumph against Liverpool back in March.
Thomas Tuchel handed Burn his England debut not long after, and he remained a rock at the back as the Magpies impressed towards the end of the last campaign to finish fifth in the top-flight.
Despite his achievements, there may be no better feeling for the Blyth-born centre-back to step out at St James Park for a European game, as he took to Instagram to post a slideshow of pictures from the Barcelona clash alongside the caption: “(Champions League) nights back at SJP” with black and white heart emojis.
The 33-year-old’s heartfelt message was reacted to by club legend Alan Shearer, who liked the post, while others such as Joelinton, Sandro Tonali, Jacob Murphy, Jacob Ramsey and Sean Longstaff all followed suit.
Dan Burn set to have a new centre-back partner this weekend vs Bournemouth
Newcastle have struggled to impress in the early stages of this campaign, despite a decent showing against Barca, with just one win from their first five games across all competitions.
Eddie Howe will likely be planning to change things up for this Sunday’s (21 September) league clash against his former club Bournemouth, due to the short turnaround from Thursday’s match, but one change will seemingly be enforced regardless.
Fabian Schar started next to Burn against Barcelona, but had to go off injured in the 63rd minute due to a concussion, so summer signing Malick Thiaw came on in his place and duly wowed Newcastle fans with his controlled performance.
The nature of Schar’s problem means he will be automatically ruled out for this weekend’s clash at least, and so Burn will most likely be starting for the first time next to Thiaw, with a potential new long-term pairing set to be formed if they shine next to each other.