Ginola14

seems like Man U's results against some really poor sides are papering over a lot of cracks there, really hope we can put out a strong team next weekend and give a good account of ourselves against them

does Bruno Fernandes ever miss a game?

End of December means he'd miss the cup tie against Chelsea. I had a lot of hope for this game after Old Trafford result but this is rapidly diminishing. Chelsea the luckiest cup side ever!

Just the 11 games between now and 1 Jan. Crazy schedule.

FML

Club is cursed! Chances of winning something always undermined by injuries... Thinking back to Uefa Cup QF against Monaco in 97 when iirc we had to play Lee up front as Shearer, Ferdinand and Tino were all unavailable. Ditto for our first season in CL following Shearer's lengthy injury when we had to resort to Barnes/Rush up front in crucial ties against PSV. Or Uefa Cup SF against Marseille when we probably would've won but for an injury crisis. Suppose having Souness in charge for Uefa and FA cups semis in 2006 was club's own doing. Now this latest injury crisis likely to see us out of Europe and underdogs away to Chelsea in league cup QF. FML ?

Ever since the takeover made him look like a complete fool following his beef with Staveley, Jordan seems to be saying nice things about Newcastle in a balanced way. From what little I've seen anyway.

Man U now ahead of us after winning 7 games against weaker opposition all by 1 goal is very annoying. Maybe I'm not giving them enough credit for grinding out victories but seems the fixture list has been much kinder to them - every defeat against anyone decent generally followed by an easy run of games. At least their next three are tough (assuming we don't get more injuries in the meantime).

Not too confident about this one. As poor as they've been for a long time, they still have the third best away record so far having only played 5 games. Bruno will be back but probably knackered after tough games against Colombia and Argentina. Other injuries are well documented and looks like they're starting to score goals now with 8 in their last 2. Could really do with Botman returning for this. Would love another Arsenal-style win but a draw would not be a bad result under the circumstances (said pretty much the same for Bournemouth) and with one eye on PSG away.

Out of 32 teams in this season's CL, only two teams have conceded more goals than Man U (11), those being Celtic (12) and Antwerp (14). And yet they still have a great chance to go through. Incredible stuff.

I did say considering the circumstances, which on balance seems incredibly unlucky to be without so many big players. If half of those absentees were available then I would expect to win. Need to manage expectations a bit.

Not too confident about this without Bruno, Botman, Isak, Wilson, Tonali, Barnes, Burn, Murpho, Anderson, Targett and Manquillo. These away games against teams fighting for their lives can be very tricky, as we saw with Liverpool at Luton. Will take an incredible effort to get all 3 points. Draw seems more likely and feel that wouldn't be a bad result considering the circumstances.

Howe also referenced Joelinton being able to play as a striker, so perhaps could also see him in that role at some point tonight. Would be interesting to see him interchanging with AG if mixing things up a bit is needed.

Most of their fans see us as favourites and would like to see their younger players instead of the likes of Rashford and Bruno... https://www.redcafe.net/matches/manchester-united-vs-newcastle-united.533/page-3 I guess they don't realise how stretched we are at the moment. Also Newcastle winning at Old Trafford doesn't really happen. Would really love that to change starting tomorrow so hoping we don't make too many changes.

I think the club should have some say in when Tonali serves his ban. Ideally that would start in January or the summer when the transfer window opens. Seems reasonable if the offences were committed during his time at Milan.

Very disappointing news. Fixture list is brutal. So frustrating. May need Howe to convert Joelinton into an effective striker for this period... .

I really hope you're right. Would be reallly nice to win at Old Trafford next week but I expect they will be favourites at home and will scrape a win. Will be very interesting if we put out our strongest available team.

Hi new poster here. Something that has been bothering me for a while is Man Utd. I've always hated them and we've never finished ahead of them in the PL. Not sure if they're just the luckiest team around or if they're actually really good and playing within themselves most of the time. Last season they finished 4 points ahead of Newcastle despite a vastly inferior GD (-20) This season they're only 1 point behind Newcastle, again with a vastly inferior GD after 9 games (-17) So over 47 games Man U have accumulated 90 points compared to Newcaslte's 87 points. In that time Man U have accumulated 3 more points despite scoring way less and conceding way more. New GS 92 GA 42 GD 50 PTS 87 Man GS 69 GA 56 GD 13 PTS 90 So for all the stick ETH gets, since his appointment he's amassed more points than Eddie Howe's Newcastle who have been mostly brilliant in that time. This despite all the dressing room and off field problems he's had to deal with (Ronaldo, Greenwood etc). And to rub it in they beat us in the cup final Surely they can't sustain this by being inferior to Newcastle in almost every metric but I find it quite remarkable how they've managed to do it so far. Anyway sorry just needed to get that out of my system!