Newcastle United have announced that assistant manager Claire Ditchburn will take charge of the team on an interim basis.
Ditchburn has previously been head coach at Durham, and also held coaching roles at Everton and Manchester City.
She will be assisted by Peter Ramage, a former Newcastle player, and the club’s current assistant loan player manager.
Goalkeeper coach Stephen Brass and first team coach Luke Thomas-Arayo will continue in their respective roles.
It follows the departure of long-serving manager Becky Langley, which was announced on Monday evening along with the confirmation that an interim coaching structure would be put in place while the recruitment process for a permanent replacement was ongoing.
Langley was appointed in 2019, and led the team to back-to-back promotions from the fourth tier to WSL2, where they finished in fifth place last season. She oversaw the move to full-time professional status while the club was still in the third tier.
She was initially head of women’s football at Northumbria University, taking on the Newcastle team management as part of a partnership between the club’s foundation and the university.
Prior to that, she had coached at Nottingham Forest’s academy while leading the women’s football and futsal programmes at the University of Nottingham.
Newcastle United: their season so far
The team are currently ninth in the Women’s Championship after six matches, winning one match, drawing three, with a goal difference of minus two.
The current Newcastle United squad includes some well-known names, including former England internationals Jordan Nobbs and Demi Stokes, with experienced US midfielder Morgan Gautrat currently on loan from Orlando Pride.
Their last match – and the last match under Langley – was a Subway Women’s League Cup game against Manchester City in Gateshead on Sunday.
The score was 3-3 after 90 minutes, and Andree Jeglertz’s team edged the shoot-out 7-6 after the Magpies scored two late on to level up.
Lois Joel had opened the scoring after 11 minutes, and Laura Coombs netted in first-half added time to send City in level at the break.
Yui Hasegawa and Gracie Prior then put City 3-1 up – but Freya Gregory grabbed one back in the 82nd minute, with Shania Hayles getting a last-gasp equaliser.
However, City got the bonus point by winning the penalty shoot-out after Khiara Keating saved Demi Stokes’s spot kick.
The team’s next competitive match is a trip to Ipswich Town on Sunday, 2nd November following the international break.
