Match Day Thread Newcastle United v Stoke City

Thursday evening and still no Match Thread for Saturday
Lazy B's.

None of that intellectual crap from me, suffice to say, if you want stats etc, go find them yourself.

I won't be there, as I'm in York for the weekend, visiting York Minster and other nearby institutions.
On the bright side, the last time I missed a home game against this lot, we scored FIVE.

2 - 1 win... Up the Premier League We Go.

 

3-1 to us, crowd buzzing, Stoke to score a consolation in the last few minutes.

 

Better than chippy's effort

 

To be fair, that's not difficult.

 

"Chippy", "effort" must be the first time those two words have ever been used in the same sentence.

 

Frustrating game in which Stoke nullify us after 5-10 minutes and then we have 80 minutes of nip and tuck football. 0-0 or perhaps a loss.

 

Heart says 3.1...heed....1.1

 

Toon 1 - 2 Stoke


Place tour insurance bets now.

 

I disagree .................. it's much better than Chippy's effort.

 

3-1 to the lads

 

Cagey 1-0 will do me. Think it will be tough though - while Stoke are only on 5 points they have had some decent results. Hopefully we have a bit of confidence from our extended unbeaten run and a rare Premier League away win and can just sneak this. We probably need to play the way we played the Swansea game (tight at the back and hit on the counter attack) which is a good thing as I don't think Rafa knows any other way.

Looks like only Dummett and Mbemba are still injured so will be interesting to see how we line up at the back and in midfield, and upfront as well.

I would go with:
Elliot
Yedlin
Lascelles
Clark
Gamez
Shelvey
Merino
Ritchie
Atsu
Perez
Joselu

Am sure Benitez would like to get Lejeune back in but can't see how he can break up the centre back pairing from last week yet. Could of course switch Clark to left back and drop Gamez.

 

Is it going to be Shakiri vs Gamez? Bit of worry pace-wise. Clark at LB might be a better idea, or even switching Manquillo and Gamez.

 

Joselu 2 and Ritchie 1 makes 3.
Crouch 1 makes 1.

I can therefore confidently predict a 3-1 win.

 

Feeling a 2-1 scenario, hopefully to us. To be fair our defence looks stauncher than I've seen it in the past decade, and that was with back up at RB and a dinosaur RB at LB for the last match.

 

2-1 defeat. Crouch rising from the bench to grab a late winner.

 

Either that or smacking his head on the dugout roof and going straight to hospital.

 

3-1 to us, Joselu hat-trick makes them realise they've given away the best striker in the league.

More realistically 1-1, would be happy with that tbh.

 

Hopefully he'll have a point to prove. And hopefully we can get him some service.

 

1-0 Gayle to come on an snatch a winner

 

We will deffo get beat