Chris Sutton convinced by Eddie Howe and Newcastle United | OneFootball

Chris Sutton has been talking about Newcastle United.

The BBC Sport pundit speaking ahead of Saturday’s game at St James’ Park.

The only Premier League game kicking off at ‘normal’ time 3pm on Saturday.

Chris Sutton thinks Newcastle will beat Bournemouth ‘convincingly’ as he takes on his old club for the first time since parting company with them in summer 2020.

The Cherries relegated by one point on the final day of the season, when crucial results / moments went against them in a cruel twist in the last round of fixtures in the 2019/20 season.

In the 25 months since Eddie Howe left, Bournemouth have appointed and sacked three different managers, with Gary O’Neil currently caretaker boss after Scott Parker got the push.

Despite O’Neil picking up four points in his two games in charge, Chris Sutton only sees one winner, declaring ‘Howe now has a few options up front and you know his side will play on the front foot and create lots of chances at St James’ Park. They should get a few goals too.’

After Scott Parker’s team conceded 16 goals in his final three games in charge, Bournemouth had a goalless draw at home to Wolves and won 3-2 at Forest after trailing 2-0.

Credit to the Cherries for these last two results but looking at the stats, it looks like they carried a fair bit luck.

Wolves had two thirds of the possession but couldn’t find a single goal with their 17 shots, whilst against Forest, Bournemouth scored with all three shots on target.

With 23 shots and 13 corners, Newcastle in their last match did everything but score against Palace (plus NUFC absolutely dominated away at Wolves as well but only got a point), even when getting a ‘goal’ the referee and VAR official finding a ridiculous route to wrongly disallow it.

On the surface at least, this looks an ideal set up for Newcastle United and one where their level of performance could well finally be rewarded with a convincing win.

However, on the opening day of the season, Eddie Howe’s team absolutely battered Forest and had 23 shots (10 of them on target) and 11 corners, whilst the visitors had one corner and zero shots on target. Yet Forest were half an hour away from a point when a stunning long range Schar strike was needed to break the desperate rearguard action from Steve Cooper’s team.

It looks increasingly likely that Newcastle will need to get the win without the likes of ASM, Bruno and Callum Wilson in the starting eleven, so hopefully we will see Alexander Isak with the kind of goal threat he showed at Anfield and other players stepping up as well when it comes to scoring and creating on Saturday.

Chris Sutton talking to BBC Sport – 15 September 2022:

“Newcastle boss Eddie Howe will be desperate to beat his former club and there are several reasons why the Magpies should do so, convincingly.

“Howe now has a few options up front and you know his side will play on the front foot and create lots of chances at St James’ Park.

“They should get a few goals too.

“They have proved me wrong before, though.