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Eddie Howe had tried everything.
The Newcastle United head coach previously sent out sides who pressed Manchester City. He fielded others who dropped off. He tried various formations, all without success.
It got to the stage where Howe was only half joking when he said "we don't have anything new left" on the eve of Saturday's game.
But he did.
When Newcastle needed a result most, following a bruising defeat at Brentford before the international break, Howe and his staff devised a plan to finally get the better of Manchester City in the Premier League.
And it paid off following a 2-1 win at a raucous St James' Park as Howe tasted victory against Pep Guardiola's side for the first time in the top flight at his 17th attempt.
"I've got lists and lists of things that haven't worked against them so I could probably tell you what doesn't," Howe said. "Telling you what does is a very small piece of paper, but you just try and learn from experience and just tweak something the next time. That's what we did."
The seeds were planted in the days after Newcastle's 3-1 loss at Brentford this month.
Howe spent countless hours analysing footage, reviewing training and attempting to find answers to what has been a curious campaign.
It may have been a smaller training group, but Newcastle tried to rediscover "their energy and athleticism" during the international break.
And there were some notable tweaks for the visit of Manchester City.
Captain Bruno Guimaraes was handed a central role in the midfield three, where Sandro Tonali has taken up residence for the best part of a year, while returning full-backs Lewis Hall and Tino Livramento started their first game together since September and made a huge difference.
Fabian Schar also made his first top-flight start in two months in place of centre-back Sven Botman.
However, rather than making radical changes, Howe stuck with his favoured 4-3-3 system and two of the three alterations to his starting line-up were effectively enforced after Kieran Trippier and Anthony Gordon missed out through injury.
The bulk of those players who lined up at Brentford and, indeed, in the damaging defeat at West Ham, were given the chance to make amends as a result.
"I don't agree with ripping things up," Howe said. "Unless you're in absolute panic mode, which we're not, and I don't believe in that style of leadership anyway.
"I think I have a very good idea on who our stronger players are and I want to try and give them every opportunity to showcase that by helping them and developing them."
Something had to change, though.
Only struggling Wolves and Leeds United had scored fewer goals than Newcastle in the top flight before this game.
Record signing Nick Woltemade had cut an isolated figure, with little to feed off, particularly on the road.
Though Woltemade was away with Germany during the international break, Newcastle worked on different movements of the players around the forward, such as Barnes and Jacob Murphy, to try to bring out the best in him when he returned.
Newcastle certainly created chances on Saturday for Woltemade, who was foiled on three occasions by Manchester City goalkeeper Gianluigi Donnarumma.
But whereas Newcastle were once over-reliant on Woltemade, others have started to step up.
Not least Barnes.
The forward was guilty of a couple of big misses in the first half - even failing to hit the target with the goal gaping - and said he was not "the most popular man" at the break.
But not only did Barnes open the scoring with a fine effort from the edge of the area in the second half, he stepped up with a winner just minutes after Manchester City levelled through Ruben Dias.
Newcastle previously led against Arsenal, Brentford and West Ham only to lose.
But they did not crumble when Manchester City drew level or, indeed, after eight minutes of stoppage time were added on.
This was an evening when Newcastle won more tackles and aerial duels, and made more blocks than the visitors.
Though Manchester City dominated possession, which naturally skews the figure, Newcastle stood up and made nearly twice as many clearances (36) and limited the visitors to just four shots on target.
That defensive effort did not go unnoticed by former Newcastle defender Jonathan Woodgate.
"Out of possession they were top-drawer and made it so difficult when City tried to find those little pockets in between the lines," he told BBC Radio 5 Live.
"Second half I thought they were the better team, kept on catching City on transitions and ended up scoring two fantastic goals by Barnes. What a game of football."
Yet should this result under the lights at St James' necessarily come as a huge surprise?
Only Manchester City (13) have won more Premier League home games than Howe's team (11) in 2025.
Since the start of last season, Newcastle have won eight, drawn two and lost just two of their home fixtures against Manchester City, Arsenal, Liverpool, Chelsea, Manchester United and Tottenham in all competitions.
However, away from home, Newcastle have not triumphed in the top flight since April.
That is the reason why this side were just a point above the relegation zone before Saturday's landmark win.
"As much as I'd like to say the crowd shouldn't make the difference to the players on the pitch, it changes everything," Howe said.
"We have to figure out a way to transfer some positive energy into our performances away when we don't have the crowd.
"That's going to be for us to fix, whether that's system related, personnel related. Whatever it is, we need to work hard to figure it out."
