Almost as soon asÂNewcastle United were relegated from the Premier League at the end of last season, pundits and fans alike were in agreement that The Magpies would be among the favourites for the 2016/2017 Championship title.Securing the services of Rafael Benitez during the summer made this outcome even more likely, although there were justifiable concerns about how the world-class manager would adapt to travelling to clubs like Burton Albion and Rotherham United.Fast forward to the present day, and Newcastle United sit, quite rightly, at the top of the table, with just a slight blip at the start of the season preventing them from leading by more points at this stage. While the side doesn’t contain the same talent as Chris Hughton’s Newcastle of the 2009/2010 Championship talent, the summer signings of Premier League-standard players Dwight Gayle and Matt Ritchie (for a combined fee of £22m) gave a massive boost to a club that managed just nine wins last season and occupied the bottom three of the division for most of the campaign.They have responded well this season, with thirteen wins and eight clean sheets, helping them assert themselves as the strongest side in the league.But their very recent form will be worrying for fans hoping for an easy route back to the promised land. While two losses in the league (as well as a quarter-final exit in the EFL Cup against Hull City) hardly represents decline, the way in which these losses occurred are faintly disturbing, particularly as Newcastle head into the notoriously busy winter period on this form.Let’s first look at Blackburn Rovers. The former Premier League champions have been enduring a dreadful start to the 2016/2017 campaign so far, with just five wins out of 18 games and rooted to the foot of the table for the opening seven matches of the season.After an enthralling 3-2 win against Brentford the week before, Rovers came to an almost-sold out St James’ Park probably not expecting to get much from a Newcastle side currently on an eight-game winning run. But Benitez’s decision to make six changes to the team who had won comfortably against Leeds United the previous weekend may have been a step too far for the club, who were on the verge of breaking club records by being the first Magpies team to win ten games in all competitions consecutively.While their 15 shots on goal is fairly average for Newcastle, only two of these were on target. A forgettable first half was followed by a slightly better performance in the second, but the two shots on target only came in the final quarter of the match. Aleksander Mitrovic, replacing Gayle in this game, was almost invisible up front, and the game was settled in Blackburn’s favour via a corner fifteen minutes from time.The mass changes made for the Blackburn match strongly suggested that Benitez was prioritising the upcoming EFLÂCup quarter-final against Hull City. Newcastle had by far the better game in 90 minutes, and were even given a gift ahead of extra time with the sending off of Tigers’ forward Dieumerci Mbokani for a headbutt on Jamaal Lascelles in the closing minutes of normal time. But the teams cancelled each other out with a goal each extra time, before Newcastle lost their tenth consecutive penalty shoot-out…

And then on to Nottingham Forest. When Lascelles put the ball in the back of his own net just four minutes from time, the home support may have had to pinch themselves to make sure this sight was real. Newcastle didn’t help themselves with two first half dismissals, as Jonjo Shelvey first saw red just after the half hour mark for violent conduct before Paul Dummett faced a contentious straight sending off in first-half stoppage time.

Both dismissals also resulted in penalties for the opposition, and perhaps The Magpies were fortunate to have Karl Darlow Âin place to stop both Nicklas Bendtner and Henri Lansbury from scoring during the first half. Matt Ritchie put Newcastle ahead at the end of the first half but, with nine men, Newcastle struggled to retain their lead. There was questionable refereeing from Steve Martin and Rafael Benitez’s post-match review didn’t look much further than this for a reason behind the loss:

“It’s very difficult to understand what happened, we can complain about the penalty not given, the goal offside, the (Forest) penalty given and the two red cards. We did really well, we were doing what we had to do but it’s a big difference when you have 45 minutes numerical inferiority it’s not easy.”

Brighton & Hove Albion sit just one point behind Newcastle and, while promotion will be the main aim, it would be a blow to such a large club not to win the league outright this year.

Benitez will have half an eye on January and the chance to refresh and boost his squad for a final push, but the next few weeks could be damaging enough for the north eastern titans if they don’t arrest this slide in form quickly.

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