Talking Point: What are Newcastle's attacking options without Siem de Jong?

WITH Siem De Jong’s untimely injury confirmed by Newcastle United with a statement on Friday, just where will the goals come from now for Alan Pardew’s thoroughly unpredictable side?

As was widely reported before the club’s confirmation, the injury to de Jong is a serious one, with a tear to his right thigh likely to keep him out until or even beyond Christmas.

The news will come as a devastating blow to Pardew, who very much championed the signing of the Dutchman as his own during the summer, stating at the time that the former Ajax skipper would bring an “intelligence in the final third and create goal-scoring situations, which we lacked towards the end of last season”.

With this now out of the team for the next four months however, what are Newcastle’s options now?

The most likely course of action it would seem would be for Pardew to revert to the team which faced Manchester City on the opening weekend in de Jong’s absence.

That day it was fellow summer signing Remy Cabella who played in the number ten position, with Jack Colback and Vurnon Anita anchoring the midfield, Yoan Gouffran and Moussa Sissoko out wide and Emmanuel Riviere up front on his own.

Ahead of Southampton this weekend this may not be possible anyway with Jack Colback a doubt following his early exit from the England squad last week with a calf complaint, but would this team work anyway?

Whilst the performance in general against last season’s champions was admirable, Riviere was desperately starved of service that day as Newcastle failed to make the most of some promising possession.

What’s more, Sissoko and Cabella have performed better centrally and out wide respectively for France in midweek since, and this could provide an alternative option perhaps.

Playing Cabella out wide would mean he would have more space to create chances and Sissoko in truth has never really looked comfortable out wide despite Pardew's insistence to play him there.

The former Toulouse man's powerhouse performance for France against Spain on Thursday night was a case in point, as he was lauded by the French media.

It must also be noted that upon Sissoko’s arrival on Tyneside in January 2013, he played in the number ten position frequently to great effect, with man of the match performances such as the 3-2 victory over Chelsea where the Frenchman grabbed a couple of goals to win the match on his home debut.

Another possible option would be to include the youthful exuberance and pace of Rolando Aarons and/or Ayoze Perez.

This would be a risk of course, but such is the recent form of Aarons in particular, it would be mad of Pardew to overlook the young winger bearing in mind his impact in the game against Crystal Palace a fortnight ago, as well as his exploits for the England U20s last week as he scored one, set-up one and won a penalty in a 6-0 win over Romania on his international debut.

Perez too has enjoyed a decent start to his Newcastle career, making his debut for the Spanish U21 side on Thursday.

With Papiss Cisse a long-term absentee, summer signing Facundo Ferreyra seemingly either nowhere near fit or not in Pardew’s plans, and the club's failure to invest in another big-name centre-forward having an immediate impact, the young Spaniard seems the only viable option were Newcastle to play two upfront.

Whether Pardew would or not remains under serious doubt as he has tended to stay away from 4-4-2 over the last couple of seasons.

In truth, the injury to de Jong should come as no surprise to anyone at the club as the Dutchman arrived with a very patchy injury record anyway, only managing 15 starts last year.

In fact, Ajax coach Frank de Boer admitted as much this week stating that the club would miss Daley Blind more than de Jong due to the fact he barely played last year: “Siem played almost nothing, so you can write that off. Only Daley played every time. So that you miss, that’s the only player [we’ll miss]”.

When taking into account that de Boer was speaking about his former club captain, this statement speaks volumes. The predicament Newcastle find themselves in can also be put down to the clubs failure to replace Loic Remy, which has now been compounded by the injury to de Jong. In short, the options and prospects for goals are worryingly limited for Pardew’s team and his decision to ostracize and ship out Hatem Ben Arfa against the fans’ wishes now looks even more misguided.