Newcastle United are making a lucky habit of coming up against teams without their best player.
We faced a Southampton side missing Danny Ings last month and were fortunate that Wilfried Zaha was unable to play in last week’s 0-2 win at Crystal Palace – especially when you see the impact he’s had in their 5-1 win at West Brom today, bagging two goals and an assist!
Now, we should be beating West Brom on Saturday regardless of what 11 they are able to field, however it can only be good news for Steve Bruce that Baggies star Matheus Periera has now been ruled out of the game.
The Brazilian was shown a straight red this lunchtime after VAR found him guilty of kicking out at former NUFC loanee Patrick Van Aanholt:
I’ll say it again, we should be beating a struggling West Brom side regardless of them being with or without their star man, but he will be a big miss for Bilic.
He bagged eight goals and TWENTY assists for them last season, while only five players outside the ‘big six’ have created more chances than him this season (Barkley, Grealish, Rodriguez, Gross, Harrison).
If we’ve controlled the COVID outbreak and see the game go ahead next Saturday, it’s one we really should be winning!
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