Newcastle v Aston Villa – Premier League match preview

Mags v Villains
Mags v Villains
Newcastle take on Aston Villa at St James’ Park this weekend looking to arrest a run of home form which has seen us lose the last four matches played in Tyneside.

The build-up to the game has seen the managers of each side clash regarding comments made by Paul Lambert who made reference to our crowd and insisted his team would start on the front foot in an attempt to turn us against our own side. Alan Pardew said he was surprised by those comments and that Lambert might regret that by the end of the game. I’m not quite sure if Pardew has been watching the same games everyone else has been watching recently?

You have to look at it and say that Lambert has a point. We’ve been on the end of too many defeats at St James’ Park recently and the atmosphere amongst fans is borderline toxic at the moment although admittedly results are just one of many factors regarding feelings right now. What Lambert said is no different to what other managers try and achieve at St James’ Park, the only difference is that Lambert had the nuts to say it publicly.

The game should be nigh on a full house with just over 50,000 tickets being sold for the game. It won’t sell out completely because Aston Villa have failed to fill their away allocation but it will still be a good attendance and shows that any stay-away notion has remained exactly that. For now at least…

Newcastle:

Loic Remy returns after sitting out the last three games through suspension. Fabricio Coloccini is also available after injuring his knee on New Year’s Day whilst Cheik Tiote returns after missing the last two games with a hamstring injury. That’s three key players returning which will undoubtedly give Alan Pardew a boost.

Aston Villa:

Andreas Weimann and Karim El Ahmadi are fit again and could be recalled by Paul Lambert. However Jores Okore, who is making good progress after rupturing a cruciate knee ligament, is still a few weeks away from a return.

Previously…

United go looking for a first league double over the Villains since the 1997-1998 season after registering a win at Villa Park back in September courtesy of goals by Hatem Ben Arfa and Yoan Gouffran.

We’ve not lost to Villa at St James’ Park since that infamous game back in April 2005. It was a 3-0 home loss that day with United ending up with just eight men on the pitch.

Generally speaking we’ve had the better of Aston Villa and a quick look at our history shows that we’ve won more games against the Midlanders than we have against any other side. Of 156 meetings between the two clubs, United have won 68, lost 55 and drawn 33 times.

Unsurprisingly we’ve also been stronger at St James’ Park clocking up 47 wins compared to just 15 for Aston Villa with a further 15 draws adding up to 77 meetings on Tyneside in total.

Stats and facts…

Newcastle have played 370 minutes since scoring their last goal at home – the longest barren run since a 686-minute drought in 2007.

Only Fulham (17) have conceded more league goals in 2014 than Newcastle (14).

Aston Villa have taken 17 points from 13 away league games – the best record of any of the bottom 11 clubs.

Villa have picked up 10 points from losing positions so far this season – the third best record in the division.

Final thought…

Put simply something has to give. Whether that is our dismal recent form or something deeper within the club I don’t know but something has to change.

When you look at the away record for Aston Villa and combine it with our home struggles you can see why Paul Lambert has said what he did. Why shouldn’t he be confident? After all we are a shambles right now.

One more win would probably be enough to call us safe if we aren’t already, and that is all that is required by the club at the end of the day. A season filled with promise and expectation warranted through a good start has faded away and now all we are left with is the wait until the summer when we can see what ham-fisted attempt the club makes at trying to rebuild.

And if I feel like that then why should the players feel any different?

Howay the lads!

Date: Sunday, 23rd February, 2014

Time: 1:30pm – Live on Sky Sports

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.

181 thoughts on “Newcastle v Aston Villa – Premier League match preview

  1. anyway enuf of the MA ****, lets not talk about MA and our future. looking through Aussies SD tinted glasses,, its all cool 😎

    2-1 to the Toon, De jong and Goof to score..

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  2. need to clarify – before Troy and Aussie keep ageing and trip a hole in time.

    Ash leu isn’t lining his pockets with our money. He has put in a lot more than he’ll take out until he sells. Good thing.

    The bad (bloody evil IMO) bit is that instead of butting or club to win stiff or any football reasons he’s running it as a marketing outlet for SD. That way he spends almost nowt on NUFC but makes hundreds of millions through SD.

    To do that requires 2 things:
    1. A good enough management team to keep the club in the prem but out of Europe while making more through player dealings than we’d get from selling advertising.
    2. A community of supporters day enough to keep giving the club money even when It’s obvious they’re being shafted and it won’t stop.

    ta-daaaaa.

    He’s an utter ******* but he’s got the Toon Army sussed.

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  3. Well one thing can’t be denied his SD companies profits have gone through the roof since buying us and advertising all over the club, meanwhile our commercial revenue has dropped like a tarts knickers. You could argue he should get the free advertising for the interest the club doesn’t have to pay on the loan originally with the bank and I would be interested to know what the loan repayments would be as opposed to the lost revenue of the advertising hoardings, anyone got any idea?. At the moment we have the TV money and Cabs fee sat in the bank, that’s a tidy sum, I won’t judge him yet, lets see how much gets spent on rebuilding the team come summer. I’m wanting to see a big commitment from the fat man on that front , anything less will prove once and for all that we are no more than an advertising vehicle for SD and fans will start to drift away and frankly he’ll have no cause to complain if that happens imo.

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  4. Apparently Ashley is sticking by Pardew and completely changing his approach. Wonder if this means we’ll actually sign a player permanent?

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  5. @STUART79

    no, he’s just making more empty promises for another 6mths, probably worried about season tickets being handed back and talk of protests.

    the 5yr plan is well out of date and its not getting better in the summer.

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  6. STUART that change means pardew will get his wish no more french players,so no cabella ect,just STARS like mark noble,Tompkins ect ect,its a joke

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  7. Ice ,if Pards does get in those British type of players, if he then ***** up he can have no hiding place since it’s obvious he feels more comfy and confident with that style of player. Also if that is indeed the type of player he feels he wants to work with then we can kiss goodbye to any creative football it will be very workman like, we probably won’t get relegated with that gritty type of player but it could be very dull viewing. 🙄

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  8. KIM my thoughts to a tee,thing is it gives us nowt to look forward too,ime praying someone buys the club,please please. 😥

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  9. They’ll be panicking with the number season ticket cancellations, that’s for sure. I think something will happen this summer to be honest. But I think Pardew will still be manager.

    Interesting summer ahead. But I’ll be doubtful we will finish top ten now if we don’t win today. Actually fancy 1-1.

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  10. Manchester United are convinced they have won the £25million battle for Borussia Dortmund’s Ilkay Gundogan.

    If Man Utd get this bloke so cheaply, aaaaargh…. believe me he’s brilliant..Cabaye couldn’t tie his shoe laces …

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  11. @Mark

    The club have just announced a £20m academy which will be state of the art facilities.

    He’s gearing the club up for a sale I reckon.

    Infrastructure in place. Profit off the pitch. Sitting strong mid table.

    He hasn’t been for 6 months. I feel the the time is coming and he’s gonna move on

    The signs are there.

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  12. AMF,pretty good big man, fair to middling. Theres a big black cloud gathering over the Gallowgate End as we speak, but conditions are changeable, it could pass over the whole ground and exit via Leazes Park, or change direction completely and head on down to Byker… time will show. 7,5000 disgruntled season ticket holders in the Leazes End could help…

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  13. Kim, I dont believe that the increase in SD revenue is directly proportional to the amount of free advertising Ashley is getting. The clubs lack of revenue has been impacted by it for sure but it is also down to **** poor management from Dekka and co.. I do agree with you about the extra money this season.. we will see what is truly going on behind the scenes come the end of the season.. interesting times ahead..

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  14. Troy, I reckon Mikey is in this all for at least another 3 years, he aint going anywhere in a hurry. The potential to make loadsamoney at the toon is too great.. A couple of hundred thousand whingeing Geordies and Ozzies aint gonna scare him off, he didn’t become a gazillionaire by being a canny lad.

    At the same time, if someone is crazy enough to offer him 350 – 400 mill then he might blink. ffs how much money does a person need stuffed under there mattress ?

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  15. HBA can and will leave for nowt, next summer at the latest..
    Just because certain players are hoying there toys out of the pram doesn’t mean that they will be leaving ..i.e. Debuchy, Collo… they are signed up to lucrative long term contracts, and Ashley tends to play hard ball… look at the Collo situation. This bunch of happy campers all fall, under the watch of able seaman Pardew who has to guide Mikey’s ship through stormy waters. Does he have it in him, when the crew are crying mutiny ? All Mikey has to do is spend 20 mill to show some intent, and the team and supporters will be back onside. He HAS to spend in the summer…there is no way out of it.

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  16. Aussie@175, I forgot you guys are 12 hours ahead of us, so you know these things 🙂 Fingers crossed mate that you are right… Hopefully the break has given the team a chance to regroup, and we can give Villa a battering. If there is one club I like battering then it is Villa… 👿

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  17. Group A: Netherlands, Czech Republic Turkey, Latvia, Iceland, Kazakhstan

    Group B: Bosnia-Herzegovina, Belgium, Israel, Wales, Cyprus, Andorrra,

    Group C: Spain, Ukraine, Slovakia, Belarus, FYR Macedonia, Luxembourg,

    Group D: Germany, Republic of Ireland, Poland, Scotland, Georgia, Gibraltar,

    Group E: England, Switzerland, Slovenia, Estonia, San Marino, Lithuania

    Group F: Greece, Hungary, Romania, Finland, Northern Ireland, Faroe Islands,

    Group G: Russia, Sweden, Austria, Montenegro, Moldova, Liechtenstein

    Group H: Italy, Croatia, Norway, Bulgaria, Azerbaijan, Malta

    Group I: Portugal, Denmark, Serbia, Armenia, Albania

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  18. AMF…cut and paste mate, but keep it to yourself 😉 See the scots have drawn Gibraltar, and interesting new addition to the euros ! I wonder if the Scots fans will have to come in helicopters cos the Spanish don’t recognise Gibraltar at all 🙂

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