St James’ Park awaits – Newcastle United v Manchester United preview | OneFootball

Welcome to the Newcastle United v Manchester United preview.

Sunday 13th April – 4.30pm kick-off.

The real United host Man U this Sunday afternoon, hoping to continue a good run of form that has seen them muscle their way into Champions League contention and win a cup final at Wembley.

A repeat of the last time the two sides met would go down very nicely indeed, Newcastle easily putting their counterparts to the sword with early headers from Isak and Joelinton sealing a comfortable 2-0 win. Man United are experiencing an incredibly poor season by their standards and, with European qualification through the league completely out of the question, may well have half an eye on the second leg of their Europa League quarter-final with Lyon.

The Toon have won four of their past six league matches. Wins have come over Leicester, Brentford, West Ham and Nottingham Forest, whilst we’ve lost to Liverpool and Man City. These twelve points have helped us up to fifth in the league with a game in hand. We’ll end this set of fixtures between fourth and seventh.

Man United have won two, drawn three and lost one of their past six matches. Wins have come against struggling sides Leicester and Ipswich, with draws against Man City, Arsenal and Everton. They lost away to surprise package Nottingham Forest. Despite this decent spell of form, Man United aren’t enjoying a good season and will end this weekend between thirteenth and sixteenth in the league. They’ll start the match an incredible fifteen points behind Eddie Howe’s NUFC.

Newcastle went to Leicester on Monday night and dispatched the foxes with three first half goals. It took Jacob Murphy only two minutes to open the scoring when tapping in at the back post and the lead was doubled just ten minutes later when Fabian Schar smashed the ball against the crossbar from inside his own half and Murphy was again on hand to force home the rebound. The scoring was completed after thirty four minutes when good work from Joelinton saw him able to get a shot away that was saved into the path of Harvey Barnes who swept the ball home to put the Toon three goals up and end the match as a contest. The second half was a bit of a dead rubber with Newcastle conserving energy. Leicester were desperate for their first goal in over twelve hours of football but couldn’t find it as they slipped further towards an inevitable relegation.

Manchester United hosted Manchester City in their last league match. It was a game that completely failed to live up to its ‘Super Sunday’ billing. A tepid affair finished goalless and talking points were at a premium as both sides seemed bizarrely content to play for an underwhelming point. They also went away to Lyon on Thursday night in a potentially tiring Europa League quarter-final. They looked on course for victory until an equaliser for Lyon in the ninety fifth minute meant the match finished in a 2-2 draw.

Newcastle have won three of their past five home matches with Man United.

NUFC have scored ten goals in their last eight matches with Man Utd at James’

The Toon haven’t done a league double over Man United in ninety four years. This will change with victory on Sunday.

Newcastle have only enjoyed eight home Premier League victories over Man United but four of those have come in the past seven matches.

Memorable match

In October 1996, Kevin Keegan’s entertainers were desperate for revenge over the Red Devils who had pipped them to the Premier League title the previous season and then humiliated them at Wembley in the Charity Shield. Both teams began the day knowing that three points would put them top of the league.

Newcastle started in rampant fashion and were desperately unlucky when Sir Les Ferdinand had a shot deflected just wide. From the resulting corner however, Darren Peacock was able to force a header towards goal that just crossed the line to give the hosts the lead. Manchester United players howled that the ball hadn’t completely gone in (replays proved that it had).

A goal down and Newcastle by far the better team, Man U became increasingly desperate and Poborsky threw himself down in the area in a ludicrous attempt to win a penalty. Thankfully, David Ginola knew how to silence the Salford cheats by lashing home an unstoppable effort from twenty yards that flew into the top corner and sent St James’ Park wild! If anyone expected a response from Man United, they didn’t get it. Shearer smacked an effort off the post before Ferdinand sent a diving header just wide from an acute angle, as Newcastle terrorised their shell-shocked opponents.

The second half brought further scoring when Sir Les buried a header in off the bar and then Shearer made it four when he tapped home a rebound at the back post after great work from Beardsley and Ferdinand. The best was left to last when Philippe Albert took a touch miles from goal and sent a chip that gloriously lobbed Peter Schmeichel as it arced into the net. A 5-0 victory was more than the most optimistic Toon fan could have dared hope for and was immortalised in a hastily released VHS (one of which was waiting for me under the Christmas tree on Dec 25th). The sight of over thirty thousand black and white fans goading a rapidly emptying away section will go down in Premier League history.

At full-time, Toon chairman Sir John Hall proudly exclaimed “you’ve just watched the champions in action.” Unfortunately, he was to be proved right…Man United would go on to win the league, leaving Newcastle with no option but to be content with another second place finish.

Played for both

Louis Saha was on loan at Newcastle under Ruud Gullit. He’s best remembered for a cracking winning goal in an FA Cup victory away at Blackburn Rovers that took United into the quarter-final. He played a handful of games for NUFC but failed to make the grade (scoring one further goal at home to Coventry) and signed for Fulham, where he had a much happier time before joining Man United. He scored thirty one league goals for the reds.

Gabriel Obertan signed for Newcastle from Man U in 2011 and spent five seasons at the Toon. He didn’t have many highlights on Tyneside but a personal favourite memory of mine is being in the away end when his last minute strike sealed a 2-0 win at Ewood Park in 2012.

Michael Owen must hold the distinction of being the only former toon player to score a winning goal against Sunderland and still be despised by Newcastle fans. Signed by Graeme Souness in 2005 for a club record fee, Owen spent four seasons at the Toon with his final game at NUFC confirming our demotion to the Championship. More interested in playing for England, the less said about his time at Newcastle the better. Unbelievably, he signed on a free for Man Utd in 2009 despite being a former Anfield hero. He didn’t get off the bench often but an injury time winner in an epic victory over Man City would prove to be the highlight of his time at Old Trafford.

Managers

Eddie Howe after a 3-0 win away at Leicester:

“Really pleased. A massive win for us. We knew it wasn’t going to be easy. We started really well and that gave us the foundation to go and win. It was a great start to the game for us. It was a brilliant first goal, brilliant execution of how we want to play. We stuck to our task. We were professional and it was really good to get a clean sheet and three goals.”

Rubin Amorin after a 0-0 home draw with Man City:

“I’m not naive or crazy, I can see the moment we are in, I can look at the opponents and understand there is a big gap, but as a leader I cannot say we are going to take all of the time to close the gap. Even if we bring in more players, we have to hurry and show urgency to do better because we don’t have much time at a club like this. We are in a rush.”

Charity

Newcastle United fans food bank will once again be collecting opposite the Gallowgate end and gratefully receiving food, money and toiletries for those in need. Of particular interest are non-perishable food and drink items (such as noodles, pasta, rice, canned food, soup, cereal, cordial, long life milk etc) as well as toiletries such as shower gel, shampoo, toothpaste and sanitary products. Please give whatever you can, any donation is very much appreciated.

For further info and/or to donate online go HERE.

Newcastle are on a roll at present having won four games in a row.

Confirmation that the top five qualify for the Champions League is a huge incentive to continue this rich vein of form.

With three matches in just seven days, this could go down as the key week in our season. The Toon are looking good whilst Man Utd have had a poor campaign. We’ve already beaten the Red Devils once this term and I’m confident of a repeat this weekend. Newcastle United 2-0 Man U.