St James’ Park awaits – Newcastle v Wolves preview | OneFootball

Welcome to the Newcastle v Wolves preview.

Wednesday 15th January – 7.30pm

Newcastle United return to league action on Wednesday night after cup adventures away to Arsenal and at home to Bromley.

The black and whites will be hoping to achieve their sixth league win in a row and their ninth in all competitions, having hit a purple patch that has seen the Toon rocket to fifth in the league and maintain an interest in both domestic cup competitions.

Wolves will be hoping to secure three points that will help ease relegation fears, they’re currently only out of the dreaded drop zone on goal difference having managed just four wins from twenty PL games so far this season.

Newcastle have been on a phenomenal run of form, having won five of their past six league matches, achieving fifteen points from a possible eighteen and scoring seventeen goals whilst conceding five. In all competitions, including League Cup wins over Brentford and Arsenal, plus an FA Cup victory over Bromley, have seen United win eight in a row. We’ll end this midweek set of fixtures between fourth and eighth in the league depending on results elsewhere.

Wolves have won two, drawn one and lost three of their past six league matches and they find themselves perilously close to the relegation zone. They did experience some brief respite in the FA Cup when a 2-1 win away to Bristol City at the weekend sealed a place in the fourth round. They’ll end our match between sixteenth and nineteenth in the league.

Last time out

Newcastle’s last league match seems a long time ago now after the Cup exploits. The Toon battled back from conceding an early goal to beat Tottenham away 2-1. Strikes from Gordon and Isak secured the three points and NUFC’s fifth league win in succession. Since then, Newcastle United have also been battling in two other competitions, beating Arsenal 2-0 in the league cup (Isak and Gordon the scorers) and Bromley 3-1 in the FA Cup. Goals from Miley, Gordon and Osula sealed our most recent win, despite being behind early on when Bromley took a shock seventh minute lead.

Wolves’ last league match came at home to Nottingham Forest and they were soundly beaten by the surprise package of the season so far. A 3-0 home defeat was far from a happy new year for a Wolves side who have struggled for consistency this season and could well be looking at a long, hard battle against relegation for the next few months. In the cup, they found themselves 2-0 up away to Bristol City on Saturday before conceding on the stroke of half-time to set up a nervy second half. There was to be no further scoring at Ashton Gate, meaning Wolves have the welcome distraction of a tie away at Blackburn Rovers in the next round.

Stat attack!

Newcastle have won their past three home matches with Wolves.

Wolves have failed to win in their past five visits to St James’ Park, drawing twice and tasting defeat on three occasions.

Newcastle have hosted Wolves on nine Premier League occasions, winning four, drawing four and losing just once.

Newcastle have never failed to find the net at home to Wolves in the Premier League.

Memorable match

In April 2011, Alan Pardew’s Newcastle were on course for a mid-table finish when former Sunderland manager Mick McCarthy brought his Wolves side to St James’ Park, desperate for a win that would take them out of the relegation zone. Newcastle started the match strongly and goals from Kevin Nolan and Shola Ameobi had us 2-0 up at half-time and looking fairly comfortable. When Peter Lovenkrands made it 3-0 at the start of the second, it seemed the points were all but confirmed. Wolves had other ideas however and pulled one back almost immediately to make it 3-1 with over half an hour left.

This was the cue for a sustained period of pressure from the away side, who hit the post before having one cleared off the line. It looked only a matter of time before they’d reduce the arrears further. Thankfully they couldn’t find the net again and the only further scoring was achieved by someone who had a habit of netting cracking goals against Wolves. When Jonas Gutierrez picked up the ball on the left wing, he had no intention of running the ball into the corner. He beat two men with fancy footwork before curling a glorious effort into the bottom corner to round the match off in injury time. Final score Newcastle 4-1 Wolves.

Darren Peacock was signed for NUFC by Kevin Keegan in 1994 and soon became an integral part of the entertainers era. He played over one hundred games for the Toon and was never afraid of doing the hard graft whilst more illustrious colleagues bombed forward. He’s fondly remembered for opening the scoring with a header in our famous 5-0 win over Man U in 1996. He’s still active as a speaker taking part in various talk-ins and is always very pro-NUFC when discussing his time on Tyneside

He played four times for Wolves during a spell on loan from Blackburn in 2000 but unfortunately suffered a spine injury against Fulham that saw him extremely lucky not to end up paralysed and led to his retirement.

Temuri Ketsbaia was signed by Kenny Dalglish in 1997 and soon made a name for himself by scoring a last minute winner against Croatia Zagreb to secure a place in the Champions League group stage. He had a knack of scoring late goals and made the headlines again in January 1998 when scoring an injury-time winner at home to Bolton and celebrating in rather bizarre style by belting the advertising hoardings in a fit of rage, relief, anger and joy all at once!

He signed for Wolves in 2000 and spent one season at Molineux, playing twenty four matches and scoring three goals.

Carl Cort joined United from Wimbledon in 2000 and scored just a few minutes into his home debut with a towering header against Derby County. Unfortunately, he was plagued by injuries over a four year period and we never really got to see the best of him at Newcastle. He did manage an absolute cracker at home to Everton in a 6-2 win in 2002 but this was a rare highlight of his time as an NUFC striker.

He fared rather better at Wolves, scoring thirty one times in ninety four appearances in his three seasons there.

Managers

Eddie Howe after a 3-1 FA Cup win over Bromley:

“We wanted to get through and win the game, and the players’ attitude has to be right. If the attitude is not right, you won’t get through. We always pride ourselves on that and I thought the lads responded really well. It wasn’t a perfect performance from us, we’re not deluded and we know we can do a lot better, but we showed the mental qualities needed and we had enough quality to get through. It was important we responded to conceding. The longer it goes on the more anxiety can creep in. It was a great response from that goal. It was a real test of nerve for us. It was really pleasing to see us equalise early, and I think that settled us down. From that moment, we were pretty good.”

Victor Periera after a 2-1 win away to Bristol City, also in the FA Cup:

“In the first half, we had a chance to score more goals, and with 3-0 maybe we close the game, but for half-time they went with confidence, and we went with some doubts. To close this game we needed to score the third goal. Second half, we had two chances to score the third goal, but they have quality, and they started to believe, and we didn’t have the quality, in my opinion, to keep the ball with us, and in the game of transition it’s difficult to control the game. In the moment that we should keep the ball, we lost the ball.”

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’s confidence will be sky high going into this one.

Eight deserved wins on the bounce is a brilliant achievement and I think we’ll be too strong for a struggling Wolves team.

Eddie Howe had the luxury of resting Isak on Sunday but our talismanic striker will be back with a bang and I fancy him to score both goals in this one. Newcastle 2-0 Wolves.