With Newcastle fifth in The Premier League after grinding out a good point at Brighton playing League leaders Man City - who have won both their games this season - the clash between The Magpies and The CityZens is being billed as the first title clash of the season with Liverpool 12th after two draws & Man Utd bottom after two defeats and only Arsenal - led by Pep Guardiola's Apprentice Mikel Arteta - also winning all 6 points.
New Twitter sensation Nick Pope was excellent between the sticks and Newcastle could consider themselves aggrieved that Callum Wilson's goal was ruled out for a high boot despite the striker's raised right foot actually being a metre away from Lewis Dunk's head before he beat Robert Sanchez to score a goal that should have stood and might have done had the referee not blown his whistle early before seeing how the move played out meaning VAR couldn't intervene and change the original decision.
Wilson clearly felt aggrieved about it tweeting the image and the denial of his second goal of the season and potentially Newcastle's second win and Alan Shearer highlighted the poor decision on Match of the Day but its the kind of wrong decision that Newcastle fans have come to expect in The Premier League and suffered from so many horrific officiating calls in the past including in the Man City home game last season when Man City keeper Ederson wiped out Ryan Fraser in the view of absolutely everybody connected with football and raised clear red flags about the integrity of the officials.
Man City won that game at St James' Park 4-0 and cruised to a 5-0 win at The Etihad on their way to a sixth Premier League crown since their takeover by The City Football Group whose majority shareholder is the Abu Dubai United Group in 2008 but its been a factor of their success that they have benefitted from dodgy refereeing decisions time and again - especially against Newcastle United.
From Hatem Ben Arfa having his leg broken in two places and Man City's Nigel De Jong not even conceding a free-kick for the foul in a game with two dodgy penalty decisions going both Man City's way in 2010:
to the late Cheick Tiote having a 25 yard goal wrongly-disallowed at St James' Park:
to Alexander Mitrovic having a second goal wrongly in 2015 at The Etihad, a goal that would have made it 2-0 to Newcastle before a second-half collapse:
Newcastle have been on the receiving end of a litany of totally wrong, inexplicable refereeing decisions denying them goals, penalties and ultimately results & points in a trend that continues to this day with Ryan Fraser's 100% stonewall penalty being denied:
The disgraceful decisions Newcastle receive against Man City form part of a wider trend of The Magpies not receiving calls from Premier League officials leading to many Newcastle fans believing there is a conspiracy against the club and I am 100% convinced of this having researched the issue for over 10 years and seen Newcastle not receive a penalty for a calendar year in 2015 nor enjoy the advantage of having a man sent off for a barely conceivable FIVE full years of Premier League and some 155 matches until Miguel Almiron had Tommy Scott sent off against Huddersfield in 2019.
Rest assured, these facts & theories will all be passed onto my new friends at Northumbria Police past and present. Back to the football...
Five At The Back Needed To Contain Haaland And Co
It took Newcastle until October 23rd, 2021 last season to secure the four points Eddie Howe's men have already accumulated this season, which promises to be an entirely different type of campaign to last based on this Premier League table from games played from the 1st January, 2022 to last weekend's fixtures which has Newcastle's
What has been especially impressive has been Newcastle's excellent defensive record banishing fears that Bournemouth's relegation was an inability by the new Head Coach to organise a defence and produce a team that is hard to beat yet chastening lessons were clearly learnt by Howe & his team and he learned from the master of football's Dark Arts, Diego Simeone with a spell shadowing the Argentian at Atletico Madrid.
Newcastle have conceded the third least goals in The Premier League in the calendar year of 2022, just 20 which is a record only bettered by Liverpool's 13 & Man City's 14:
and 10 of those 20 goals conceded in 21 Premier League goals were conceded in just two games, both away from home and one was a 5-1 thrashing at Spurs despite taking the lead through Fabian Schar & the other a 5-0 hammering at The Etihad off Man City.
One of Newcastle's best defensive performances of the season and indeed all round performances was the 1-0 robbery by Chelsea at Stamford Bridge due to refereeing decisions as highlighted earlier but it was a great all-round game by Newcastle and Eddie Howe got his tactics spot on playing a back five comprising Jamaal Lascelles, Dan Burn and Fabian Schar with Javier Manquillo and Matt Targett wing-backs which worked a treat against the reigning World and European Champions and but for disgraceful refereeing, Newcastle would have won the match.
With Nick Pope and £37M man Sven Botman, who made his debut last week keeping a clean sheet against Brighton, in the defence, Newcastle can extend the fact that they are yet to concede a goal this season against Man City, the only other Premier League team not to let a goal in but who let in three against Liverpool in The Community Shield.
Newcastle's only recent victory in The Premier League against Man City came in 2019 under the guidance of then Manager Rafa Benitez, whose defensive 5-4-1 and counter-attacking tactics worked to perfection in a game that was also notable for having a strong referee in Paul Tierney, who disallowed a CityZens goal after they took a quick free-kick before the whistle had blown and awarded Newcastle a deserved second half penalty when the roving Sean Longstaff was fouled that Matt Ritchie hit home:
Sean Longstaff, now 24, was enjoying a break-out season in The Premier League that was sadly curtailed by injury at West Ham but he did enough that game to impress Pep Guardiola and to attract the attention of Man Utd who said to be lining up a £50M bid.
Longstaff's Newcastle career has been stop-start since then but he was also excellent at the end of last season against Arsenal when The Magpies beat The Gunners 2-0 and Mikel Arteta ranted in the Arsenal 'All or Nothing' documentary in the St James' Park changing rooms that "They were 10,000 times better than us today":
Longstaff was a big part of that win setting up Bruno Guimaraes for the decisive second security goal in the second half and also looked excellent in pre-season in Germany rattling in an excellent goal and his competitiveness and pressing are weapons that would edge him into the team ahead of Joe Willock, who is better as a supersub.
Champions Man City picked up where they left off last season with two wins out of two at West Ham and at home to Bournemouth yet that 3-1 loss in The Community Shield to Liverpool will give Eddie Howe and Newcastle hope ahead of the game.
Erling Haaland was poor that game missing an easy chance and cutting a generally frustrated figure but despite responding the perfect way with a brace against West Ham, he failed to notch against Bournemouth last weekend and Sean Wright-Phillips - whose son scored for Stoke last night - has a theory that the Norwegian will find it easier to score away from home due to the way teams set up at The Etihad:
“It’s been a fantastic start for him. At the start of the Premier League he’s managed to get two goals and one assist in two games. I think he’s been fantastic.
“I think he’s more likely to score more goals away from home because of the way teams play when they come to the Etihad. It’s going to be an interesting journey and a massive learning curve and if he gets it right he’s only going to improve and make his all round game better because he can play in all situations. ”
Pep Guardiola has backed his new young gun - who flew to Marbella this week for a holiday - to succeed massively in The Premier League and warned rivals that he is just approaching the type of form and fitness that made him the most sought after striker in world football before he chose to play at Man City:
"When you have a striker and you play against two central defenders and two holding midfielders, you are surrounded by four or five players and it's the most difficult job in the world.
"Maybe in some games, we will find this type of defence but with time he will make the right movements with the right tempo and the ball will come to him. But he still made an incredible assist for the first goal and step by step he is going to understand."
Former Newcastle player now Bournemouth manager Scott Parker spelt out the challenge facing The Magpies after seeing his side decimated by Man City:
"They are the best team I have ever seen. They are the most well coached, functionally, technically, everything about their game model is very difficult to play against. Positionally, you often find they always have things locked down."
In his pre-match presser, Eddie Howe called the visit of Man City "the ultimate test":
And after revealing only Ryan Fraser and Matt Targett are doubts for the game, Howe poured cold water on star midfielder Bruno Guimaraes' link with a move to Real Madrid and the possibility of Newcastle being featured on a fly on the wall documentary:
There'll be no hiding place against Man City on Sunday yet a positive result and famous win would have Howe relishing every moment of the spotlight. HoweAy The Lads!
Prediction - Newcastle 2 Man City 1
Potential Line-Ups:
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