Newcastle United host Manchester City at St James’ Park on Saturday night for what feels like the 50th meeting between both teams this season, but to actually play a match for the rights to punch a ticket to the quarterfinals of the FA Cup.
In fact, this marks the fifth time Newcastle and City will face each other across all competitions, with no further matchups in their schedules barring a Champions League final showdown between Magpies and Cityzens.
Eddie Howe’s side is coming off a massive win
2-1 against Manchester United in the Premier League on Wednesday despite playing the second half with 10 men, thus ending a three-match home losing run in the league.
The Magpies have already beaten Bournemouth and Aston Villa to reach this stage of the FA Cup, and won’t have Jacob Ramsey available after seeing red against Man Red. Bruno Guimaraes, Fabian Schar, Emil Krafth and Lewis Miley remain unavailable, while Tino Livramento is a game-time decision and Nick Woltemade is back available.
Manchester City, meanwhile, arrives hurt as hell after a 2-2 league draw with Nottingham Forest and what might have been a deciding outcome in the title race, now all for Arsenal to lose as the Gunners cannot be better positioned to snatch the cup.
That said, Pep Guardiola’s side has already eliminated Newcastle in a national cup competition after destroying the Geordies in the Carabao Cup earlier this season, and have won 18 of their last 20 FA Cup matches.
On the bright side of things, Pep should be expected to rotate his side at least a bit, as the Cityzens will be playing a hellaciously tough Champions League game against Real Madrid on Wednesday.
Here are some of Howe’s Wisdom Nuggets, courtesy of NUFC.co.uk
On team-news:
“Nick [Woltemade] should be okay, had an illness and lost a bit of weight. He trained yesterday individually and felt okay so that’s a positive. Lewis [Miley] will not make the next couple of games.
“Tino [Livramento] is getting there, let’s wait and see. He hasn’t trained with us yet but he has done a lot of work. There’s no question on how his fitness is. He has been running for a long time.
“He has a lot of work behind him, but it is just that training time with us.”
On facing Manchester City:
“The games against Manchester City have all been close. We’ve have had chances against them. I don’t think we’ve been as clinical as we need to be to win those games and, of course defensively, we need to be watertight.
“They’re always going to test you. They are a difficult team to pin down in every moment. It will be a proper FA Cup tie where it’s one of those end-to-end games. That will suit us and we will need to get the crowd involved.”
On William Osula, who scored a late winner in Wednesday’s Premier League victory against Manchester United:
“Will is something that always works on his game. He’s got a lot of areas to focus on and continue his development.
He’s worked incredibly hard since he’s joined us and Graeme Jones has done a lot of individual work with him. He has done really well since his injury because it was a frustrating one, a long time out and static where he couldn’t do too much with his ankle.
“He is confident again in his ankle and physically getting better.”
On home atmosphere:
“The crowd react to us. It is our duty to set the tone and I felt we did that against Manchester United, with a bright start, energetic and positive in our outlook trying to score and attack in the right way.
“The crowd then backed us to the very end and helped us get us over the line to win that game. We need a ferocious St. James’ Park but that’s going to come from our body language and start to the game.”
Howay!
- Date: Saturday, Mar. 7th
- Kick-off: 20:00 BST / 15:00 EST
- Location: Etihad Stadium, Manchester (England)
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