Hope is alive and kicking at Newcastle after all. Just as Eddie Howe’s players seemed to be sliding, incrementally, towards mediocrity, a place in the Carabao Cup’s last eight changed an entire narrative.

Quite apart from creating the tantalising possibility of securing a long craved piece of silverware and, with it, a back door route into Europe, this cup run is helping camouflage the off stage tensions that have contributed to Newcastle’s latterly disappointing Premier League form.