Newcastle vs Man United is one of the more eye-catching festive Premier League fixtures and this should be a fascinating tactical battle between two recently-appointed managers.
Head to Head
Manchester United have enjoyed the monopoly in this recent match-up with the Red Devils winning each of the last four meetings between these sides. They ran out 4-1 winners at the beginning of September with Cristiano Ronaldo marking his return to English football with a sensational brace.
Newcastle’s last victory in this fixture came back in October 2019 with Matty Longstaff, currently on loan at Gateshead, scoring the winner. However, the Magpies have typically struggled against this opposition, and have managed to secure maximum points in just three of the last 26 meetings. The bookmakers are expecting the visitors to continue their recent dominance and they have been priced up at odds-on. The majority of bettors are unlikely to be satisfied with such a prohibitive price and exploring other markets could be the way to extract some much-needed value from this context. Ensuring that your chosen online bookmaker has a wide variety of markets is an absolute necessity and sites such as BettingTop10 provide honest reviews to help ensure that punters make the right decision before signing up to a betting site. In this instance, Bet365 Ireland is highly recommended when it comes to betting on Premier League football due to its simplicity and sheer breadth of betting options.
There have been plenty of goals in recent clashes between these sides with the last four contests featuring 19 goals.
Last 5 meetings:
September 11th 2021 – Man United 4-1 Newcastle United
February 21st 2021 – Man United 3-1 Newcastle United
October 17th 2020 – Newcastle 1-4 Man United
December 26th 2019 – Man United 4-1 Newcastle
October 6th 2019 – Newcastle 1-0 Man United
Newcastle
It’s been a tough start for Eddie Howe and although there are much easier fixtures on the horizon, he is unlikely to enjoy facing both Manchester clubs in the space of a week. The Toon have also recently squared up to Liverpool, and although they battled admirably throughout the 90 minutes, they inevitably came up short at Anfield.
Howe has tasted his first victory in the North East with the Magpies narrowly edging out Burnley at St. James’ Park at the beginning of month. However, that success remains the club’s only victory this season and they remain deeply entrenched in a relegation battle.
Despite their lowly position, they have only been beaten a few times on their own patch and managed to avoid defeat against Brentford and Norwich recently.
Bolstering the squad in January will be the priority for Eddie Howe, however, it may be much tougher to attract players if the club remain rooted in the relegation zone.
Despite their problems, Newcastle do tend to find the back of the net at home and managed to score in seven of their first eight matches at this venue.
Manchester United
Manchester United have also made a change in the dugout with Ralf Rangnick replacing the under-fire Ole Gunnar Solskjaer at the end of November. The former Leipzig coach has signed a six month contract before moving into an advisory role. He’s made a decent start to life at Old Trafford and has won each of his last three fixtures.
Although they’ve benefitted from some easier fixtures, United have managed to keep clean sheets in each of their last two outings and with their latest two games having been called off, Rangnick will surely have had time to implement a few of his ideas ahead of this clash.
Although he doesn’t feature in every game, the ageless Cristiano Ronaldo remains their biggest threat and he has already netted seven times this season, including twice in the reverse fixture.
United have lost just twice on the road this season and have conceded four times in each of those defeats.
Prediction
Newcastle have undoubtedly improved under Eddie Howe and although they were recently beaten by Liverpool, they did manage to score the opener and ask a few questions of the Reds’ defence. However, they could potentially be facing Manchester United at the wrong time. The visitors are thriving under the new regime and will surely be the fresher of the two sides having not played a competitive fixture for 16 days.
Newcastle 1-2 Man United