Newcastle United v Manchester United – Premier League match preview

Magpies v Red Devils
Magpies v Red Devils
Steve McClaren will go looking to guide his side to a first victory of 2016 against Manchester United at St James’ Park tomorrow night.

Much has been written about Louis van Gaal’s side this term but they are at least away from any kind of danger at the bottom of the table. The same cannot be said however for Newcastle.

With both sides seemingly struggling to find the back of the net you may be forgiven for thinking that this game may have a look of a 0-0 about it but in reality that would be no use to Newcastle who need to start finishing off some of the chances they’ve been creating.

And that is essentially the crux of our problems. We not been bad at creating chances, our defence has tightened up and is nowhere near as leaky as it was earlier on in the season – it’s literally the end product that is hurting us and with back-to-back home games within a few days that simply has to change.

Newcastle:

Henri Saivet (at time of publishing) is yet to be named officially as a Newcastle player so if it happens between now and then he will be unable to make his debut in this fixture.

Fabricio Coloccini will undergo a fitness test while Florian Thauvin and Kevin Mbabu picked up knocks against Watford and are likely to miss out. Jack Colback has trained has trained and could return to the side.

Longer term we still have Tim Krul, Steven Taylor, Papiss Cisse, Massadio Haidara, Vurnon Anita and Gabriel Obertan sidelined while Rolando Aarons and Emmanuel Riviere are back in training but are not yet in contention for a recall to the matchday squad.

Manchester United:

Bastian Schweinsteiger is out after picking up a knee injury in the 1-0 win over Sheffield United at the weekend. Morgan Schneiderlin is doubtful while Ashley Young and Michael Carrick could return after missing out their FA Cup game.

Previously…

This is not a good fixture for United with victories few and far between. The 5-0 will obviously stick out as will others like the two 3-0’s and the 4-3 – all at St James’ Park – but we’ve also been on the end of a few hammerings in a fixture that tends to favour the Red Devils.

Newcastle have just shaded the figures at St James’ Park winning 31 of the 78 games played compared to 30 wins for Man Utd.

Overall is a very different story though as Manchester United have won over half of all encounters home and away notching up 80 victories from 159 games played compared to just 41 victories for Newcastle.

Stats and facts…

Manchester United have lost just two of their previous 26 league clashes with Newcastle, winning 18 of those.

Newcastle have lost more points from winning positions (12) this season than any other side.

The Magpies have not found the back of the net for 412 minutes and counting.

Manchester United have lost their last two away league fixtures. They have not lost three consecutive away league games since 1996.

Final thought…

Where do I start as a final thought? That doesn’t mean that I have a lot to say because I don’t. I guess the only thing I really can say is that we must get a result here. I don’t fancy us for a win, ut now the question is whether a draw is enough from this game or not?

Howay the lads!

Date: Tuesday, 12th January, 2016

Time: 7:45pm – Live on BT Sport

Venue: St James’ Park

About toonsy

A lifelong Newcastle fan and current webmaster of this very 'blog who has the sole aim of creating a place by Newcastle United fans, for Newcastle United fans.

143 thoughts on “Newcastle United v Manchester United – Premier League match preview

  1. So we’ve got the pic of Saivet with the strip in the tunnel.

    Another French midfield / winger type. Just what we need.

    Not.

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  2. crazy storeys flying round already this latest one is the guy was worried about coming in case we go down so he has free transfer clause put into contract if we go down,seems bloody strange to me

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  3. So any French league followers able to tell us anything about this Saivet? I have no idea what position he plays and what he brings to a team.

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  4. Ice, it was said 2 weeks back he was hesitant on joining us.
    Just can’t get excited by this signing at all sadly, never thought I would get say that.

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  5. Kimtoon,

    You don’t care because, like a magic show, once the trick is exposed, it loses appeal. We know the technique now, we do not sign what we need, we sign who is cheap or near the end of a contract or seems possible to sell in 18 months for more than we paid. Being French does not seem to hurt with Graham Carr’s fetish either.

    Other clubs sign who will improve the team, we sign who will improve the spreadsheet and Carr’s erection difficulties.

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  6. So basically nobody has a clue about this player, including the internet. All I can find is he’s an attacking player but his stats are rubbish and he was injured for 120 days last season.

    Even McClaren did not explain what exactly he brings. Not convinced but proofs in the pudding I guess.

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  7. Shamrock,

    He was a big buzz a few years ago when he got “Wonderkid” status on Football Manager. I remember signing him on Football Manager about 4 years ago with Davide Santon and we ended up getting both. I suspect I know Graham Carr’s scouting system.

    He kind of faded away as he never left France with the hype but whether that is a bad thing or not, who knows.

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  8. I still believe we are going down this season. All we have left is injury prone players or the ones who don’t want to be here. Some players may have regreted joining the club and wished they were somewhere else. We don’t compete to win so why bother attitude is ruin this club.

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  9. Whilst I’m glad we’ve delved into the market and made a signing who can actually contribute to the first team rather than a random youngster, this little quote sums it up

    “Henri is someone the club have been watching for a while, and he has developed into an excellent player at Bordeaux. ”

    The club. Does Schteve know anything about him? Unless we plan on sacking him and the new man has already assented to the signing (obvs not happening) you have to wonder at the point. Will the lad get much game time?

    Sign Remy and we’ll survive, assuming he can be bothered to play for us like.

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  10. More to the point Terry, which of the teams above us are more likely to go down instead of us ?
    Swansea ?
    Bournemouth ?
    or Norwich ?
    Norwich have a 6 point advantage already
    Bournemouth will battle to the very end
    Swansea….. Thats our only hope. Plus we must find a way to get points back of the scum. If not, then we are gone. We certainly have more than just a toe in the water already.

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  11. Remy will come for the right money.
    Shame is we won’t offer it him and someone else will.
    simples

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  12. The Mail are saying we received an 8 mill bid for Tiote. If true, I can’t see the club refusing as it will fund a fee for Shelvey and they can swap wages. The story has been NUFC need to get a high earner off the books in order to pay new players and Tiote and Cisse are the obvious candidates. The question is though, will Tiote play against Man U or will they wrap him in cotton wool?

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-3394672/Newcastle-offload-Cheick-Tiote-8m-bid-Shanghai-Greenland-Shenhua.html?ITO=1490&ns_mchannel=rss&ns_campaign=1490

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  13. Beardo – aye you’re right there lad. If only we’d paid the right money in the first place. We’d either have ended up selling him for 20 mil to Chelsea, in which case there’d have been no excuse for not buying another striker of quality, or we’d have kept him and avoided this current mess.

    Ice – think you’re right there mate. To be fair, maybe the lad will be quality and slot right in, in the best case scenario. It still shouldn’t really be the way the club is run though….once in a while grabbing someone can work a treat – only need to look at Perez. But it just shouldn’t be the general approach which we seem to make it to be 😕

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  14. Newkie I picked up on that too. ‘The club’. So that’s McC saying; ‘he’s not my player’. What a stupid system. I can’t wait until Ashley and his half wits disappear.

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  15. Eric – would make sense, and I guess I would do the deal as Tiote is past his best whilst Shelvey is on the up. Shame really because he’s better in our side than Colback or Anita imo and would have preferred to keep him and get rid of Anita, but I guess there are even less suitors for him.

    I’m still surprised by this rumour though, why are Swansea thinking of selling one of their better players to a relegation rival? They’re not even making that much on him from what they paid Liverpool….? Just doesn’t make much sense to me like.

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  16. Sham – aye, Pardew said the same thing a few times, I can’t quite remember what Hughton said but I remember vividly Carr making a strong statement to the effect that Tiote was his signing and not Hoots. (That was when Tiote looked to be an absolute steal and was being touted at 20mil or so). Just a shambles really isn’t it. Bring in players and hope the manager figures out how to use them..

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  17. I see people on other boards asking why we need more central midfielders? Because the ones we have are **** or injured… Tiote, not interested and often injured. Anita, injured and not good enough. Colback, OK but hasn’t created chances or scored goals.

    That leaves Wijnaldum who we are playing as a number 10 and Sissoko who has looked better and has been brought inside a bit. I think he will be OK on the wing.

    You can’t have it both ways – moaning about letting Bigi and Abied go and then wonder about new central mids. We cannot play with 2 holding mids and any upgrade should be applauded.

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  18. Beardsley boots very true. Sadly I can see Swansea staying up. The only thing I’m happy about is Ashley loses his advertising money. The club has done absolutely nothing to excite me this season. Knocked out of all the cup’s and in the bottom three deservedly.

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  19. Our problem is that our current midfield are all tidy players but don’t exactly do anything well except make a lot of short sideways passes. Anita has had enough chances to know he should be sent back to Holland. Colback and Tiote pick up early yellow cards almost every match and then can never be as effective for fear of a red. I actually think both could do a decent job, but not together as we then have zero creativity. As I have said though, an upgrade would be welcome.

    If we get Shelvey, we dont HAVE to start them both immediately. We could play Colback and ease one in. Colback is on 9 yellows anyway and will be suspended after one more. Probably for West Ham as I can see Mike Dean favouring Man U as usual.

    BTW I have seen quotes that Anita’s injury is quite bad so I think he is out for a while.

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  20. Eric – we defo need a creative centre mid, I’d have preferred one in the Cabaye mould though, someone who is probably best at dictating play from a bit further back. I understand this guy plays a bit more forward than that though. I don’t think our defensive mids are up to scratch so that would help cover two bases and maybe we can just have one of Anita or Colback run around and do the dirty work. Still, we’ll see what this lad can do. Would it make sense to get this guy and Shelvey though? I’d rather we sign a proper striker….Saido is being linked, no thanks, he’s about the same age and hardly any better than Perez!

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  21. Eric – i’d prefer to play Colback and Tiote together actually, because then our four forwards could really concentrate on actually creating chances and getting in the opposition box, along with letting our full backs get at them. We know that Gini and Sissoko are poor defenders, and Perez and Siem aren;t much cop either and are wasted further back. But as you say, one or both will be carded in the first half and then we’d struggle…Anita just doesn’t do it for me.

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  22. Newkie: I think we can get Shelvey AND a striker. They have set it up so that a lot of the wage bill drops off this summer and will be reduced further if they can get fees for Tiote and Cisse who both have 18 months left.

    I don’t really care about Tiote and Cisse as we would still get a fee in the summer, but if we can shift them now it would open the door for new signings. I think the club have said this in not so many words by saying we would sell to buy.

    The higher earning out of contract players we never see anyway:

    Taylor
    Marveaux
    Obertan

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  23. Eric – yeah I guess we could. I’d be surprised but in a good way I guess.

    Would much rather Remy than Berahino though…he’d be cheaper too and therefore more realistic 😆

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  24. Newkie: Tiote and Colback have looked OK together but we still lose. Any of the 3 would do OK with Cabaye I think, but they don’t provide enough to do anything without a “main man” next to them who would offer more threat and generalship.

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  25. I got this from one of Dr. Ed’s bloggers. Everything makes sense now. Carr gets all of our French players from The Mondial Agency. Take a look at the list, just about all of our recent buys are on there. You will also notice that some of the players that we were said to be after but didn’t get are NOT on there. It seems that the Great and Wonderful Wizard Carr, just sits there and waits for these Agents to call and send him videos:

    http://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/mondial-sport-management-amp-consulting-sarl/beraterfirma/berater/2106

    Also remember, that when this Mondial Group are not involved we have tended to **** off the French Chairmen with low ball bids.

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  26. It begs the question of what does Carr actually do? He scouts the Dutchies who have been hit and miss. Perez wasn’t supposed to be his and he has recommended virtually nobody from England, Africa, South America or Asia. I think Cisse was his and Ba was a free that was pretty much a free no-brainer apart from the possibly dodgy knee.

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  27. Of course it could be that Mondial just have the better players on their books. But then, Carr should still not be taking the credit and setting himself up as a super scout or Director of Football when he just sits there and waits for the phone to ring from the French Jerry McGuire.

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  28. In case anybody can’t be bothered to look it up, here are some names of players represented by Mondial:

    SAIVET
    Cabaye
    Sissoko
    Thauvin
    Mitrovic
    Debuchy
    Cabella
    Ben Arfa

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  29. Let’s look at Carr’s Dutchies:

    Anita – average at best
    de Jong – was knacked when we got him, knacked for a year and might still be knacked
    Janmaat – I’d give him a B+, but he was Dutch national rightback.
    Wijnaldum – how much scouting is required to find the League winning Captain and Dutch player of the year?

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  30. You could say Aye, but we still had to get these players “over the line”. That’s not Carr’s job though is it? His job is to find them, not sign them. I think he is a bit of a charlatan.

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  31. NUFC.com have also now picked up on this Mondial connection. I think the veil of scouting guru might be being peeled away from Carr’s shriveled baldy heed.

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  32. Let’s say you go to the best french poodle dealer in France and they have 50 puppies of which you select 8. Are you a genius? In addition, most of the other puppies that you didn’t select went on to win cups and trophies at various dog shows. Are you a genius?

    I think there has been a bit of taking credit where it is not due. In Carr we Trust 🙂

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  33. So another untried from the French league is our first signing. Who’d have thought it… Shelvey next apparently but God only knows who the striker will be.

    Reckon Tiote to be sold. Wouldn’t bother me.

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  34. Tiote, Willo will be sold, Fergy released. Need to start clearing some of the other *****, Obertan, Rivi etc

    😯 Newcastle have now spent close to £50m in the summers of 2014 and 2015 to sign Rémy Cabella, Manu Rivière, Aleksandar Mitrovic and Florian Thauvin. The quartet – and Cabella returned to France in the close season – have scored five goals in 82 Premier League games between them.

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  35. good link Eric.

    I’ve always wondered if Carr actually watches our game “in depth” to get an understanding of what type of players we need and the different attributes they can give. defensive/ attacking / goal scorers? Or is it just cheap and profitable.

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  36. Henri Saivet is the fifth Senegal-born player to sign for the club, after Amdy Faye, Abdoulaye Faye, Lamine Diatta and Papiss Cisse.
    All ****, so bodes well then.
    Will he wear gloves too I wonder ?

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  37. 5 1/2 year contract 😯
    what in Gods name would make him sign for that amount of time to a relegation threatened club ?
    1 big bonus if we stay up
    2 A nice cheap get out clause if we dont
    I smell another mercenary.

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  38. so sick of this club right now.
    I hope he proves me wrong, but I still dont think he is enough to get us to survival.
    I assume he will be making his début tonight against manure. Which decent footballer wouldn’t ?
    Should be interesting.

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  39. So our new is player is deemed **** and he hasn’t kicked a ball for us yet 😯
    Unbelievable…. the craic on here used to be good… the blog has been over run by sad sacks that want to moan about every little thing.. 😳

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  40. Well I might be going against the grain a bit here but – welcome to NUFC Henri Saviet.
    He wasn’t on my wish list, but our current squad aren’t cutting the mustard, so if he can come in and improve it or help win some games then he’s a good signing wherever he’s from.

    More signings needed though!!.

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  41. AMF: I don;t see many complaints except BB. I actually don’t think it will take that much for Saivet to improve on what we have in centre mid. Why don;t you take it upon yourself to change the direction of the craic instead of moaning about it. A moaner moaning about moaning.

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  42. Eric, there is no point…. its not my job to cheer up the miseable ones on here., well done to Sharpy for his last post tho….

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  43. Alright AMF: have a look at the Chronicle boards. That always makes me laugh because the so-called supporters don’t have a good thing to say about anybody or anything at the club.

    I suppose i was moaning about Carr but it was a revelation to me that he got most of the bigger Frenchies from the same Agency. All this stuff about inside knowledge basically boiled down to him getting tips from this Agency.

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  44. No need to apologise Eric, I couldn’t give a **** if you find me funny or not mate.,.. im not complaining at all.. merely hi-lighting how joyus the vibe is on here…

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  45. Who has said Haivet is ****? I haven’t seen any post that say he’s ****.

    I see a few who are questioning the wisdom of buying another young player from abroad with no PL experience after the amount of time it’s taken players to adapt recently. Are they not legitimate comments?

    Seems to me that Aussie just wants to depict the blog as a miserable, moaning and negative blog to live up to his own expectations.

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  46. Anyway, it looks like we will probably get Shelvey and they are going all out for a centre forward. That will be about 3 quarters of peoples’ wish list.

    I kept seeing people say we were set in centre mid but that assumed we moved Gini or Sissoko there who haven’t really been tried there for us. There were many more negative about Tiote, Colback and Anita than were positive so I don’t see why we shouldn’t welcome Saivet.

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  47. 2015 was a very difficult year for NUFC with very few glimmers of hope apart from the summer recruitment of players most of us had never heard of. We are third bottom with a manager who was sacked from a Championship club to replace an idiot. Is it supposed to be rainbows and candy floss on here?

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  48. Eric – We’re suppose to be coming on here saying how good it is to be in the bottom three, not being able to score and having won about 8 games in the whole of 2015.

    It’s great isn’t it!!!

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  49. Stuart: just the 4 1-0 losses in a row to cheer us up. There’s still hope though, we have 2 new players for Saturday and Man U are also at a low ebb.

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  50. If you try to be positive you get accused of being a happy clapper, if you say we are in trouble you get accused of moaning and not being good craic.

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  51. I can’t believe Swans are selling Shelvey to their main relegation rival. They must think he is such a disruptive influence that he will poison our dressing room. Do you know that it was 48 days from him being in the winning England team against France to him not even being on the bench against Man U for Swans. He wasn’t injured either.

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  52. Whenever I watched Swans I thought Shelvey was their best player. Montero played a couple of blinders then disappeared, Ayew went off the boil and Gomis cant buy a goal.

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  53. We have shown positive intent now and I think that means we will get one of Austin, Berehino, Lacazette, Dost or Remy (on loan). Is the gloom finally lifting? We shall see after tonight’s result 🙂

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  54. So Sky are reporting that Andros Townsend has told Spurs that he doesn’t want to leave for WBA but wants to come to Newcastle! Now if we can buy Townsend, Shelvey and a striker I would be very happy….

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  55. Stuart: a loan for Townsend as I am not fully convinced. Believe it or not they showed the Chelsea/Spurs reserve game on US TV today. Townsend scored twice in a 5-4 game. I am surprised they risked him if they want to sell.

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  56. Shelvey will be a superb signing for us I think. It’s a footballing signing IMO.

    Other relatively good news today is that Andros Townsend has told Spurs that he’s not interested in joining WBA and he only wants leave Spurs for Newcastle – who are interested according to Sky sources – so we obviously don’t fancy paying £14m.
    Personally, I’d get the deal done and get him in. Maybe try and loan him with a fee of £14m in the summer.

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  57. Stu – beat me to it mate.

    Eric – just saw those goals. Cracking penalty and good right footed finish for his 2nd. He’d be another good fit for our team I reckon. Would love Shelvey, Townsend & Remy – that would be an excellent window IMO.

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  58. Eric – I’d stick with Mbabu on the left personally until the summer and look to sign either Williems from PSV or Alonso who is free in the summer – Williems would be my choice though.
    We’d also need to replace Colo in the summer.

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  59. Sharpy, Yes he can be the impact player we need to bring that spark, he needs to apply himself quickly though.

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  60. ——————— Elliott ——————-
    ————— Mbemba – Colo ————-
    Janmaat —————————– Mbabu
    ——— Sissoko – Shelvey – Gini ——–
    Townsend —————————- Perez
    ——————— Remy ——————–

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  61. Kim – I think Sissoko & Gini are real quality midfielders & I think Shelvey would feed off that quality. I think he will have a fire in his belly to prove Swansea wrong & to try and make that England squad. If we can get Townsend in as well, I think he’ll want to give Hodgson something to look at as well.

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