Welcome to the Arsenal v Newcastle United preview.
Saturday 25th April and a 5.30pm kick-off.
Newcastle United travel to Arsenal this weekend hoping to stop the rot after four successive defeats in all competitions.
An added bonus for the travelling Toon Army could well come in the form of contributing to Arteta not winning the title.
This is yet another NUFC match broadcast live on TV, giving the away fans an extra two and a half hours to lubricate their singing voices.
Whilst Newcastle have seemingly nothing of note to play for, Arsenal will be desperate for the three points having lost their way a bit recently. They’ll have every incentive to get the job done and regain top spot in the league table.
Form
Newcastle have won two and lost four of their past six league matches. Well-deserved wins have come over Chelsea and Man United, whilst defeats have been endured against Everton, Mackems, Crystal Palace and Bournemouth. We’ve scored eight goals and conceded ten. The six points gained in this sequence has us languishing in a deeply-disappointing fourteenth in the Premier League table and a win could see us twelfth on goal difference depending on results elsewhere.
Arsenal have won four and lost two of their last six league matches. They’d won four in a row against Tottenham, Chelsea, Brighton and Everton before losing to both Bournemouth and Man City to lose the initiative in the title race. They’ve scored eleven goals and conceded six. The twelve points gained has them second in the league and in real danger of bottling winning the league. They could regain top spot with a point against the Toon, with Man City playing in the FA Cup semi-finals today.
Last time out
Newcastle hosted Bournemouth hoping to draw a line under consecutive defeats to Barcelona, the Mackems and Crystal Palace. Unfortunately, Toon fans were met with more of the same as a disjointed first half performance saw the Toon deservedly behind at the break. The second half started in a similar vein until the introduction of Bruno on the hour gave fans and players a much-needed boost. A few minutes later he was instrumental in creating a chance for Osula who scored with a well-taken finish. Just when it looked like United might be in the mood to go on and win the match, all-too-familiar defensive failings reared their ugly head once more and we conceded a ridiculously soft goal to lose yet another match that was there for the taking.
Arsenal travelled to Man City last Sunday in a real six-pointer as both sides maintain ambitions of lifting the Premier League trophy. Arsenal suffered an early blow when Man City took the lead but were back on level terms just a minute later in farcical circumstances when a goalkeeping error gifted them an equaliser. A point would have been a decent return for Arsenal and maintained their advantage in the title race but a second-half winner for Man City has taken things out of Arteta’s hands. Shame.
Stat attack!
-The Toon have lost twelve and won one of their past thirteen league visits to Arsenal.
-Newcastle have won just two of their twenty-one visits to the Emirates Stadium in all competitions.
-United beat Arsenal at the Emirates as recently as last season when they won the League Cup semi-final first leg 2-0. This was followed by another 2-0 win in the second leg that took the Toon to the Wembley final where we famously beat Liverpool to win our first major trophy for fifty-six years.
Memorable match
In December 2001, Sir Bobby Robson’s Newcastle travelled to Highbury knowing that a two-goal victory would put them top of the league. The pre-match build up provided the following hilarious exchange between the wonderful Sir Bobby and this poor reporter:
Reporter – “If you win by two goals, you’ll be top of the league.”
Sir Bobby – “‘If’ is the biggest word in football. If I had wings I could fly to the moon.”
Reporter – “Would you like to be there though?”
Sir Bobby – “Would I like to be where, on the moon!?” (press room fills with laughter).
The match itself was a far more serious affair. Arsenal started on the front foot and battered Newcastle for most of the first half. They took the lead after twenty minutes when Pires finalised a team move that contained a blatant handball in the build up. The Gunners however managed to shoot themselves in the foot at the end of the first half when Ray Parlour was finally punished with a second yellow card having made five appalling fouls up to that point.
The second half saw Newcastle try to make the extra-man advantage count and this persistence was rewarded on sixty-minutes when Lua-Lua, freshly on from the bench, swung in a perfect corner from the right and Andy O’Brien buried a header for just his second goal in a black and white shirt. Newcastle now had the bit firmly between their teeth but the referee ludicrously levelled the playing field when Craig Bellamy waved his little finger in the direction of Ashley Cole and the Arsenal man threw himself to the turf holding his face like he’d been shot. Bellamy’s red card was, rightly, overturned on appeal after the match but the Toon now had the daunting task of trying to win with just ten men. Arsenal came at United desperate to find the winning goal but some desperate defending prevented them from retaking the lead. With just
four minutes left, great link-up play between Dyer and Lua-Lua led to Laurent Robert being played through on goal with just the ‘keeper to beat. Sol Campell tried desperately to stop him scoring the winning goal but his slide tackle from behind in the area led to a penalty and the chance for Alan Shearer to score his first ever league goal at Highbury. Our talismanic number nine smashed the ball down the middle to send the away fans wild but even better was to come. As the clock ticked past ninety minutes, Arsenal were pressing for an equaliser but a defensive clearance led to Lua-Lua chesting the ball before once again playing Robert through on goal. This time there was no foul as our mercurial Frenchman took the ball in his stride and slipped it past the ‘keeper to secure a fabulous 3-1 victory. Newcastle were top of the league and celebrating their first win in London for over four years.
Arsenal 1-3 Newcastle Marvellous!
Played for both
Malcolm Macdonald – Some of our older readers will have fond memories of this legendary number nine. ‘Supermac’ scored a hat-trick in his first home game, against Liverpool. What was to follow has gone down in Toon Army folklore! Scoring one hundred and twenty-one goals in just two hundred and twenty-seven appearances has him up there with the best of the best in NUFC history. Perhaps his finest hour came in the 1974 FA Cup semi-final when he scored two second half goals to defeat Burnley 2-0 at Hillsborough and send United to their first FA Cup final for nineteen years. Unfortunately, he couldn’t repeat this feat at Wembley as a tame performance was punished by a 3-0 defeat to a Kevin Keegan-inspired Liverpool. There was uproar when he was sold to Arsenal for a third of a million pounds in 1976. He went on to score forty-two goals in eighty-four league games for the Gunners.
Andy Cole began his career by playing one league game for Arsenal before being loaned to Fulham and then sold to Bristol City. Kevin Keegan broke the club’s transfer record by splashing out £1.75 million for the striker in 1993. This is a number nine whose record stands up to anyone else’s – a whopping sixty-eight goals in eighty-four matches before being controversially sold to Man United in January 1995 for a British record transfer fee. Some fans were so angry at the sale that they turned up at the stadium demanding answers, which Keegan provided, famously standing on the steps to explain his decision. King Kev would go on to sign both Sir Les and Alan Shearer as the entertainers came ‘so close’ to being champions of England for the first time since 1927 but that’s a story for another day.
Sol Campbell was something of a legend at Arsenal having run down his contract at arch-rivals Tottenham to join the Gunners on a free transfer. He’d go on to win a number of trophies and even grabbed a goal in the 2006 Champions League final. He played a handful of games for NUFC in 2010 but it’s safe to say he was well past his best when donning the famous black and white.
Managers
Eddie Howe after a 2-1 defeat at home to Bournemouth:
“I don’t think it was us at our best. I thought it was quite even between the goals. I don’t think there was a lot in it. They are obviously on a good run of form and playing with confidence. We are on the opposite end of that. That probably balanced out a performance where they were more productive in front of goal than we were. Ultimately, that was what decided the game. You have to understand the rough and the smooth and take both sides of that. We are not delivering what we want and we have to accept that. I’m beginning to say the same things as well and that’s a huge frustration for all of us and that’s the players feeling that frustration as much as anyone else. I think the late goals, there was no reason for that to happen today. The big moment of the game goes against us and there’s a couple of big actions in that goal. We lose headers, we lose our runner, we let a cross come in the box, that’s been systematic of what’s happened in recent games. My belief in myself can’t waver and it’s not. I think that is in every moment where we try to stay level and calm and don’t believe the hype. It has to work in reverse the other way where I have to retain a belief in my work and my staff and what I do”
Mikel Arteta after a 2-1 defeat away to Manchester City:
“Obviously, the players were very disappointed not to get a result from the game in the manner that it happened. That’s the feeling immediately, you could say that they were talking about, and they said, ‘OK, we lost an opportunity today, but we have the biggest one now in the next five games, so let’s do it.’ If I have to pick up the players to win the Premier League with five games to go, and winning in our hands and in the semi-final of the Champions League, I think I should be at home. So it’s not the case. It’s not needed. It’s never been needed, even in difficult moments. So we will go again, that’s for sure.”
Charity
As it is an away match, Newcastle United fans will not be collecting opposite the Gallowgate end, for the food bank. However, you can still help out and all online cash donations are very much appreciated. For further info and/or to donate to the food bank online.
Prediction
There’s no denying that Newcastle United have been desperately poor in the last few matches. Arsenal however will be feeling the pressure having handed the initiative to Manchester City in the title race. The fact I live and work in North Manchester these days means I could be very popular should the Toon do the business this weekend. I think we’ll see a nervy Arsenal performance punished by NUFC who will be good value for a hard-earned point.
Arsenal 1-1 Newcastle.