FA Cup 3rd round preview – Stevenage v Newcastle.

Giuliano Grazioli equalises for Stevenage back in 1998.
Newcastle kick off their FA Cup campaign against Stevenage Borough tomorrow evening, and they will surely be hoping that events run a lot more smoothly than they did the last time these two sides met way back in 1998.

Back then, Newcastle had been flying high for a few seasons in the Premier League and had superstars such as Alan Shearer within their ranks. It took two matches and the intervention of Shearer for The Magpies to progress past a plucky non-league Stevenage outfit, although the lasting memory of the encounter will be the off-field arguments between the two clubs.

Most of the trouble centred around the Stevenage ground. Newcastle officials claimed that Broadhall Way, or The Lamex Stadium as it is currently known, was unsafe to hold the larger than normal crowd that was anticipated on the day, and this was before our officials even visted the ground. Much mud was thrown and Newcastle were made to look like the bullies after attempting to get the game switched to St James’ Park.

Stevenage won out on that occasion and the game went ahead as planned with the addition of a temporary stand. The events around that day lacked class from all parties. Stevenage weren’t innocent in the whole affair and their chairman at the time acted like a bit of a ******, but we hardly covered ourselves in glory either. If you want to cast your minds back to that match you can do so by watching this video.

Fast forward 13 years and we find ourselves in the position of having the exact same fixture, although this time the build up to the game has been an all together quieter affair with matters centred around team news rather than horrer stories about the two clubs bickering.

Speaking of team news, Alan Pardew will have to make do and mend as he takes an injury plagued Newcastle side to Broadhall Way. The visitors will be without several first team players for the game, with several more likely to not be risked in preparation for the Wear-Tyne derby match next weekend.

Midweek hat-trick hero Leon Best is struggling with a heel injury whilst Steven Taylor and Cheik Tiote are both struggling with hamstring strains. All three of those injuries were picked in the 5-0 victory over West Ham.

Andy Carroll, Sol Campbell, Alan Smith, Ryan Taylor and Hatem Ben Arfa are all definately ruled out through injury whilst Steve Harper will miss the match on comapssionate grounds due to his wife being heavily pregnant. The one bit of good news is that Dan Gosling could feature at some point for Newcastle.

I expect that we will play a mixture of youth and fringe players, although any sudden recovery to any senior players could well see them involved aswell. For what it’s worth I would go with a team looking something like this;

Newcastle: Tim Krul, James Perch, Mike Williamson, Tamas Kadar, Shane Ferguson, Wayne Routledge, Danny Guthrie, Kevin Nolan, Xisco, Nile Ranger, Peter Lovenkrands.

Stevenage will be missing Darius Charles for the match tomorrow as he serves the last game of a three match ban. Byron Harrison will be unavailable for The Boro as he is cup tied after already playing for Carshalton in an earlier round.

Joe Byrom, Darren Murphy and Lee Boylan will hope to be in contention after shaking off recent injuries, although manager Graham Westley could name an unchanged team from the one that beat Barnet on Monday.

Stevenage: Chris Day, Scott Laird, Luke Foster, Mark Roberts, Lawrie Wilson, Stacy Long, John Mousinho, Michael Bostwick, Charlie Griffin, Rob Sinclair, Chris Beardsley, Rob Sinclair.

The last time these two sides met in the cup it took two games to seperate them, as you may have seen if you watched the video earlier up in the article, but by the end of the cup run Newcastle found themselves in the final.

Hopefully the omens will be similar this time around.

Howay the lads!

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.

180 thoughts on “FA Cup 3rd round preview – Stevenage v Newcastle.

  1. No Enrique
    “going home … had a high fever to play while traveling and at least try. hopefully the team to win today and move on to the next round.”

    Didn’t he get told off for revealing this against Spurs? hahaha ahh well

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  2. Toonsy, coming back to your reminisces(?) re the last meeting, that was a classic example of Fat Fred shooting his mouth off and alienating the Toon who came across as too big for their boots when we had been everyone’s second team. Don’t know if anyone caught the 95/96 season highlights on Christmas eve ? on Sky, but great to watch that team again and King Kev’s passion for the Toon.

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  3. he said it’s been on the radio this morning, so it’s ok, that’s why he put it on there

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  4. DJG – he’s doing ok, but clearly loves the sound of his own voice, which will come back to haunt him and no doubt us. Bet he can’t pass a mirror without kissing it

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  5. Shocking behaviour, but Stevenage were no saints in the whole thing and blabbed all the time to the press about how we were trying to force them etc.

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  6. Hi Munich, hotel is right on Clarke Quay. Company uses two hotels – this one and another on Orchard Road – quite a lot of night time activity goes on down there, so a bit dodgey as a lone female out and about!

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  7. For those who don’t know,Slovenian midfielder, Haris Vuckic, has signed a new five-and-a-half year contract that will keep him at St.James’ Park until Summer 2016.

    Great news about that. But somehow gives me this thought.Ish Mike Ashely truly leaving,something fishy about the recent re-contract of players. 😯

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  8. Sorry Geordie Deb…for some reason cannot seem to reply on your Singapore post. Spent a week down there working a few years back….mega place, had a great time. Lucky you…how’s the weather just now ?

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  9. What’s with this five and a half year contract stuff, crazy, why does EVERYONE get a contract of this length, including the manager, really unheard of ? In all my time working, following football etc I’ve never known out like it. Must say I’m happy to see Vukic signed up, would like to see the Bull signed up next off.

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  10. Maybe we have a contractual wizard out there who can enlighten me of this 5.5 year contract business…

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  11. http://www.competition.dz/Actualite/Ziani-Newcastle-:-cest-acquis/

    Basically,An agreement was finally reached between both parties to sign Karim Ziani.

    Wolfsburg could drop to 2.8 million euros
    Well, as agreed, discussions have indeed been undertaken before last Tuesday in England to discuss the modalities of the future of the Algerian contract with salary and length. To this end, we learned that an agreement was finally reached between the two parties in this sense since making some concessions on the amount of your monthly payments which are 300 000 with his current club and has the Algerian agreed to review a bit down, both sides managed to reach an agreement. And also over two and a half years under his current contract, a proposal was made Ziani for another year. What makes the darling of the Greens is expected to sign a contract for 3 years and half in all.

    Now there remains only the last stage of this transfer since as already announced in our previous editions, Karim Ziani favors the trail of a permanent transfer and the loan would be for him a last resort.

    So an appointment was made for tomorrow Friday between the clan and sporting director Ziani Wolfsburg to discuss the compensation of the transfer. But for Ziani, these negotiations should be a hindrance to the transfer, since on the list of those released, the German officials would like to get a little more money to pay 300,000 euros per month and that at least until the end of this season, which already represent a good windfall, ie nearly 2.5 million.

    The player has made concessions on salary
    Thus, it is understood that the indefiniteness transfer initially set at EUR 5 million by executives from Wolfsburg could almost halved to $ 2.8 million, which should pose no problem English club Newcastle, who is quite willing to pay that sum.
    It is also clear that given the agreement reached between the English club and the player, Ziani should, hopefully, going to England later Sunday or on Monday to pass a medical and then sign his contract and begin training with his new team.

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  12. sorry Deb yeah she is back home now 🙂 so she is going to try to get a job but if she dosn’t have any luck within a few months she is talking about going over to london, where she has been told she would have a better chance 🙁

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  13. DAVE it could expain a couple of things like we were close last time,ash was seeing money there, could have been start of slippery slope.
    toonsy doesnt rate the guy much fletcher i think his name is who writes that blog

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