We will know more by the end of the year. January will be a relief to see where the squad injuries are and what cover we need to go an get but until then this run is terrifying with the injuries we have! Saturday 25th November Premier League Newcastle United v Chelsea Tuesday 28th November UEFA Champions League Paris Saint-Germain v Newcastle United December 2023 Saturday 2nd December Premier League Newcastle United v Manchester United Thursday 7th December Premier League Everton v Newcastle United Sunday 10th December Premier League Tottenham Hotspur v Newcastle United Wednesday 13th December UEFA Champions League Newcastle United v AC Milan Saturday 16th December Premier League Newcastle United v Fulham Tuesday 19th December Carabao Cup Chelsea v Newcastle United Saturday 23rd December Premier League Luton Town v Newcastle United Tuesday 26th December Premier League Newcastle United v Nottingham Forest
LB is the big concern, I don't think Hall's ready. He really struggled against Dortmund. I'd wonder if Dummett can do a job? The workload and lack of rotation has hit us very hard. Everyone is out for quite lengthy spells.Think top 6 will be beyond us - top 4 is probably already gone, Chelsea are improving, Man U will always get lucky wins. We're then in a fight with Brighton and Villa just to get 7th.
Don't think we can judge Hall on the Dortmund performance he was up against Adeyemi who is the Usain ****ing Bolt of football and picked up an early booking
I'm pretty sure we will finish behind City, Arsenal and Liverpool so 4th would be absolutely top anyway. Tottenham could implode, Man Utd and Chelsea both look OK but not great and Brighton and Villa are good teams but not top 4 teams. I think we'll finish above a few of those but behind a couple so about 6th. No shame in that. I went with "outside top 6" as I'm not as confident as I sound.
If everyone could just vote without covering their views with mental gymnastics that would be appreciated.
Were you not waffling on about this in every other thread enough for it not to need its own thread? Top 6 includes top 5 btw, so your first option is completely unnecessary. Top 6 - very likely, would be disappointed if we don't get at least that Top 5 - I think we're better than Villa and Brighton atm, and def better than Man U and Chelsea, so very possible Top 4 - tougher than last year, but I can see Spurs falling away a bit with the Van Der Ben injury, so not out of question Top 3 - don't see it
Goal was a catalogue of errors from just about everyone, but Lascelles in particular, who missed his challenge. Harsh to blame Hall. In hindsight he maybe should have just headed or kneed it for a corner. Happy for him to have an extended run in the team. Our back-up players will never be ready if we don’t give them game time.
Things can change massively in a short space of time though, ie it could get worse or we could be back to full strength very quickly. All I'll say right now is that we're doing exceptionally well despite numerous injuries, and generally getting excellent results.
We've played 11 games, why do we all need to make a prediction now that we sign our name in blood to and can't go back on? We hammered Villa first game, then lost 3 in a row, then have been on fire since, it doesn't make sense to predict now given the variables going on. However if you want a prediction from me right now of where we'll finish, 5th would be my guess right now.