Newcastle United vs. Aston Villa: 26/12/24 @ 15:00 (Amazon Prime Video)

[McDog]

Just now, joeyt said:

Keep a winning team or replace Joe with Joe?

 

 

Probably make that change but it's close. Eddie will know.

[Infinitely Content]

Not sure it's close at all to be honest, Joelinton is miles ahead of Willock.

[RS]

They’ve transitioned into the realm of the nouveau big clubs better than we have unfortunately.  And European football seems to be having no impact on their league performances .

Real test for us this.

[BonesJones]

17 minutes ago, RS said:

They’ve transitioned into the realm of the nouveau big clubs better than we have unfortunately.  And European football seems to be having no impact on their league performances .

Real test for us this.

 

How are they looking injuries wise in comparison to us in our CL point of the season? I can't remember when the injury pile up happened tbh?

[janpawel]

20 minutes ago, RS said:

They’ve transitioned into the realm of the nouveau big clubs better than we have unfortunately.  And European football seems to be having no impact on their league performances .

Real test for us this.

Didn't they have an 8 or so game streak where they didn't win and lost the majority? 

 

But yeah, they're a very good team and were very good in their last game 

[janpawel]

Looking forward to this game. They have a lot of threat through the middle of the pitch, whereas we tend to attack down the flanks, should be a good one

[Chris_R]

28 minutes ago, RS said:

They’ve transitioned into the realm of the nouveau big clubs better than we have unfortunately.  And European football seems to be having no impact on their league performances .

Real test for us this.

 

We finished 4th and then 7th

 

They finished 4th and are currently 6th

 

Yeah, night and day between the 2.

[brummie]

I hate this fixture. I used to hate it when i lived in Newcastle, too. It never went well. It's just one of those places where I always think "it's going badly" with no reference whatsoever to league form. 

 

Having said that, it's going to be a draw. 2-2. Get on that straight away, that's some serious free money for you.

 

We are slowly emerging from the first rough period under Emery. We've started to recover from some injury problems and had Onana and Kamara together for the first time in ages yesterday.

 

It's not a continual upwards progression, there will be ups and there will be downs (I said that on here re you a while back, and got shot down with 'that's easy to say when you're doing well', but I still believe it, and do so now it is us coming out of a rough patch). That goes for both sides, so who knows how it will pan out.

 

 

[BonesJones]

It's an interesting one from Howe's point of view each time this game comes up imo, in terms of wanting too beat the guy that was "first" choice.

 

We can smash these, let's see both quality teams. Thinking that they won't be able to handle our midfield currently, we will dominate the game there and setup Isak with ease, leaving a CB flat on his back!

 

Going to be one of those games. Toooon! Feels ages away though with the whole Christmas thing going on.

[Mike]

6 hours ago, 54 said:

Referee: Anthony Taylor. 

Assistants: Ian Hussin, Neil Davies. 

Fourth official: Leigh Doughty. 

VAR: Graham Scott. 

Assistant VAR: Mark Scholes.

 

Cunts.

[Rod]

2 hours ago, Infinitely Content said:

Not sure it's close at all to be honest, Joelinton is miles ahead of Willock.

We won 4 nowt on Saturday and it should have been 7 or 8.  Something must have worked with the team selection.

[alexf]

Really hard to call this. Last few times at home we have smashed them, so you would assume they will learn their lesson and approach it differently, but Emery might be stubborn and let's hope that high line plays into our favour again.  

Both teams look to be hitting some form, both have strikers on it, strong midfields with good balance. We really need to protect Burn and Schar from getting isolated against Rogers and Watkins/Duran as they will get rinsed for pace. 

Likewise we need to exploit the spaces and get our 3 in behind as much as possible. 

[Geogaddi]

Feel strangely confident for this one , Villa obviously a good side but no reason we should be scared of playing them at home . 

[BermyToon]

12 minutes ago, Geogaddi said:

Feel strangely confident for this one , Villa obviously a good side but no reason we should be scared of playing them at home . 

Feeling confident also after our recent good run of form and past history of Villa at home. Predicting a 3-1 win.

[NEEJ]

11 hours ago, RS said:

They’ve transitioned into the realm of the nouveau big clubs better than we have unfortunately.  And European football seems to be having no impact on their league performances .

Real test for us this.

Is this true though? For comparison, we were 7th on 29 points at the same stage last season. 

[80]

Reminiscent of our confidence going into the West Ham game...

[SUPERTOON]

 

[alexf]

Villa have had it easier than we did last season imo.

 

They were in a better PSR place than us regardless of needing to sell Douglas Luiz because there squad was stronger than ours pre-takeover. So they were building from a better foundation, thanks to the Grealish sale. 

 

Not only did we have the group of death in the champions league and in the old format, we also had the fixtures from hell if you remember last year, especially every single cup draw. So with a small squad of quality anyways, it was difficult for us to rotate and play weaker sides in hardly any of those early season games, and then ofcourse came the injuries. 

 

Then there was the Tonali situation which was the bulk of our summer budget, plus Barnes and Botman getting serious injuries both in the same game.

 

We had a hell of a year last year and I still think it's impressive we came away from it 7th and had Europe snatched away by a hungover Man city not turning up against Man U. I think under most managers that would have been a 14th/15th right it off completely type season.

 

Villa got to have a trial run in the conference last year, blooding alot of their squad, then this season they were able to strengthen their squad over the summer better than we did and have had a far nicer champions League pathway with the new format. They also haven't had the horrific fixtures and cup draws we got and therefore have been able to avoid anything close to the injury nightmare we encountered.

 

Having said all that, win on boxing day and we go above them and can try and push them til the end of the season where hopefully the lack of Europe for our squad will start to take effect and give us some advantage. Unless we go far in the fa cup and get to final of league ofcourse, which could prove a distraction.

 

 

Edited 1 hour ago by alexf

[AyeDubbleYoo]

2 minutes ago, 80 said:

Reminiscent of our confidence going into the West Ham game...

Hmm, I wouldn’t say there’ll be any complacency because of how good Villa can be. 

[Ronson333]

We should have too much for them in midfield, Tonali & Bruno are better footballers than Mcginn, Onana & Kamara. 

[Andy84]

We’re going to win this imo.

 

Good side at home which we tend to do well anyway.  We’re just as good as them, and with home advantage we’ll get the job done

[80]

1 hour ago, AyeDubbleYoo said:

Hmm, I wouldn’t say there’ll be any complacency because of how good Villa can be. 

Was thinking more of the fans than the players. But agree they should come into this knowing it's a serious battle - and hopefully the West Ham result will itself help concentrate minds.

[McCormick]

Need to win this. Hate this lot.