Game On! Newcastle v Aston Villa

toonsy
St James' Park.

St James' Park.
Game On at St James’ Park
Good afternoon all and welcome to the ‘Game On’ article for our tussle with Aston Villa at St James’ Park.

Ordinarily I’d be banging on about home advantage and how we should be making it work for us but results since the turn of the year make any notion of home advantage redundant when it comes to Newcastle United.

Four successive home league defeats (or five if you include the FA Cup loss to Cardiff, although we did at least score a goal in that one) with ever increasing differences in the scorelines (0-1, 0-2, 0-3, 0-4) paint a worrying picture. Mitigating circumstances could include the sale of Yohan Cabaye, a failure to replace said Cabaye, and the loss of a number of first-team players, three of whom should return for this match, but in reality we’ve deserved what we’ve got from recent matches.

To find out if those three players have returned you’ll need to check the team news which I will get up as soon as I can once it is released. You can find it at the bottom of this article but whilst you’re waiting why not cast your eye over the match preview and familiarise yourself with some history, some facts and some injury news?

The game is being shown on Sky Sports here in the UK and has also been chosen for broadcast by a host of overseas channels so picking up a stream shouldn’t be too much of an issue. If you do find a good stream then please share it by leaving a link in the ‘comments’ section below.

Which just about covers everything I need to mention ahead of the game. I just hope I’m left with something decent to report on come full-time. Actually, not even decent, just a win will do!

Howay the lads!

Newcastle: Tim Krul; Mathieu Debuchy, Mike Williamson, Fabricio Coloccini, Paul Dummett; Moussa Sissoko, Cheik Tiote, Vurnon Anita, Yoan Gouffran; Loic Remy, Papiss Cisse

Subs: Rob Elliott, Massadio Haidara, Mapou Yanga-Mbiwa, Steven Taylor, Dan Gosling, Shola Ameobi, Luuk de Jong

Aston Villa: Brad Guzan; Leandro Bacuna, Ron Vlaar, Nathan Baker, Ryan Bertrand; Ashley Westwood, Fabian Delph, Karim El Ahmadi; Gabriel Agbonlahor, Christian Benteke, Andreas Weimann

Subs: Jed Steer, Yacouba Sylla, Grant Holt, Ciaran Clark, Marc Albrighton, Aleksandar Tonev, Joe Bennett

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.

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421 thoughts on “Game On! Newcastle v Aston Villa”

  18. The fact that we need a goal and we are bringing on gosling says everything you need to know about our squad and the negligence this regime are guilt of.

    Pardew cannot make a silk purse out of a sows ear I’m afraid.

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  36. You look at the reaction from the players and tell me that Pardew isn’t the best manager under this regime.
    Spirit is still there underneath all the gloom Ashley has heaped on them.

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  37. Thank f00k for Remy – has been a **** poor game but I’ll take a last minute win – pretty much means we won’t be relegated

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  45. get the **** in.

    Can’t believe we didn’t get a pen or that Vlaar was still on the pitch but so fucking happy we finally scored :mrgreen:

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  47. Kin el, talk about relief… look how the players and bench celebrated that goal !! In a nervy and at times poor game, the best team won…

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  50. Stu – there will be more than just KK crying into their pints tonight mate 😆

    Scrappy but nee fluke! Back to 8th in the league only 5 points behind 6th spot.

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  52. Bazza@198, spot on there mate, I was thinking the same thing. He looked a tad rusty, but he held the defence together…

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  53. Anita looked a lot better at the end there. A relief to score, but was that game total dogshit? Maybe my sense of the second half was colored by the awful 1st half. Am I the only one who’s still depressed by this game, even though we won?

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  54. My God we got lucky. We deserved that as long suffering fans. We need to buy this guy Remy he is the difference.

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  56. De Jong and Cisse are both too physically weak for the EPL in my opinion, they have trouble holding off defenders. However, De Jong has better vision when he gets the ball, Cisse is a better finisher… Tricky really, but I would try the De Jong / Remy partnership, cos Cisse / Remy didn’t work today, the constant negative being Cisse unfortunately.

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  58. Sharpy – We are only 5 points of 6th but some people still say Pardew is doing a bad job! Crazy!! Under the extreme constraints he’s under he’s doing a very good job.

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  59. What we did learn though was De Jong looks like a decent player and will be a good foil for Remy. Shame he’ll be gone… 😥

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  60. MM, I would tend to agree on that@206 , for me Cisse looks totally devoid of confidence now it’s a terrible shame really. I do think De Jong has the better intelligence for the PL to partner Remy and he will get stronger with gym work as Anita has but the real key to our future success is dependent on buying Remy .

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  61. Stu @ 205 yeah especially when you think all the long he has been here and he isnt even our player,
    Maybe it shows the team is a bit tighter than we think

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  62. First half was utter cack, lets not get ahead of ourselves, we need to start playing like the second half for the full 90 + or we will always falter.

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  63. we were **** and you all know it other than like one minute and an on loan striker we could have signed for 9 million but now can not sign for 16 million. where are the goals coming from when he is gone? its remy and cabs, that was our entire scoring department and next season not there.

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  64. Kim @212 agreed but I am hoping we saw a team without confidence find their confidence today as the game went on

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  65. Dave ,I don’t think the issue is the tightness or togetherness of the team , it’s more a case of them being very badly let down by a feckless owner and an often tactically struggling manager .

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  66. After all the doom and gloom created by fans and journalists the last few weeks that was a good performance. I don’t think Villa had one clear cut chance that entire game. We were in control for the majority of it.

    Anita showed what he is all about in those last 25 minutes pure class.

    Williamson and Coloccini where amazing at the back. That interception at the end by Williamson was just as important as the goal.

    Tiote was dominant again today he was a massive miss for us the last few games.

    Remy was excellent today as well. I thought he came a bit deep at times but he done well with possession won some good free kicks.

    We were unlucky not to have scored at least 2 or 3

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  67. MDS@214, yes they should gain some momentum from that win , it shows what you can achieve if you keep pushing to the last second and they didn’t let the fact we never got that stone wall pen effect them either, it actually galvanised them I think. We should also admit we benefitted from Westwood going off who was superb for them first half.

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  68. On the way back – nervous, we need to replace Cabs, and poor Cisse, but the lads won because we wanted it desperately, and kept going, and because Colo organised the defence so well. You can’t say Pardew’s lost the dressing room. Interesting summer…

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  69. Santi@216 , Got to disagree we edged it thanks to second half showing but Villa could and should of had a couple early doors imo. Everytime they went forward my heart was in my mouth for the first 30 odd mins.

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  70. @sharpy17 & stuart79
    Not quite sure what you two lovebirds are getting at?

    Even if we had lost Pardew would have kept his job so the result makes no difference to him. Pardew is Mike Ashley’s puppet so he’s not going anywhere soon – you can thank Mike Ashley now 🙄

    I (& i’m sure alot of other fans) celebrated when we scored. What has the players celebration got to do with Pardea & team spirit??

    The win is the only positive. The performance throughout the match was terrible.

    An individual piece of brilliance from Remy but still we’ll say how fantastic pardew is under Mike Ashleys direction. Good job Pardew & good job Mike Ashley!

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  71. Stu – exactly mate 😉

    Craig – blah blah blah, get back in ya cage til next match day mate when you can come out and spit ya poison again then. What was your prediction again 0-2 wasn’t it? great call buddy 😉

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  72. Having colo back proved vital for our defense. We looked more composed and comfortable on the ball. Hopefully we can land another defender like him ASAP

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  74. Agree with kimtoon @215

    Anita had to step into the creative mid role for us to actually start playing football. Very good vision & passing from him in the last 20mins.

    De Jong also did well.

    Cisse did well too despite the miss although people will remember him for that. They’ll also forget remy missed an open goal.

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  75. Steven Taylor out of the defence, everyone looks better and we keep a clean sheet. It’s no coincidence. Get rid and sign some quality please.

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