The Boxing Day is approaching fast and on Thursday, Manchester United will host Newcastle United at Old Trafford. This will be the second meeting of the two sides, as they have already met in early October. It has been a lot of time and plenty of games have been played since, so we will be asking the question how have been Newcastle doing since 6 October.
Last time the two sides met, Newcastle won 1-0 at St James’ Park. That was a big disappointment for the Devils and in the following two and a half months, not much changed in Manchester. Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s team is still doing really well against the bigger sides and still dropping points with ease against the likes of Watford, Bournemouth or some of the newly promoted sides.
Newcastle In Good Form
Last time we spoke about Newcastle, we were saying that they need to bounce back. The reason for that is that they had only one win since the start of the season and even that one was a truly lucky one against Tottenham Hotspur. We also said that Steve Bruce’s side really needed to make some improvements, especially in attack and they literally did all of the above.
They won 1-0 against United and then they continued with good results. Sure, there have been three losses in the meantime, one of which was against Chelsea, but they also managed to get a draw against Man City and beat West Ham, Bournemouth, Southampton, Sheffield United and Crystal Palace.
All of that meant that Newcastle are now equal on points with Man United, with 25, whilst winning seven matches, compared to United’s six. So these past couple of months have been really good to them, having 10 points more than the best placed side in relegation zone.
Miguel Almiron Broke The Ice
Miguel Almiron joined Newcastle last January as their then-record breaking transfer signing. He came from Major League Soccer champions Atlanta United and a lot was expected of him. But he did not start so well in goal contributions. His first assist came only this season and his first goal for the Magpies came last weekend in a 1-0 win over Palace.
The Paraguayan finally broke the ice and that means he will feel relieved for finally ending the bad streak. This could make him even more dangerous, but what Man United should pay attention to are his swift transitions which made Newcastle pay attention to him in the first place.
Hot Streak From Jonjoe Shelvey
Former Liverpool and Swansea player is having a lot of fun this season and Newcastle have had a lot of good things come out of that. The somewhat controversial midfielder has already scored five goals for Magpies in the Premier League this season, which would be odd in its own right, but the fact that he scored them with the expected goals amounting to just 0.98 indicates how hot his goalscoring streak has been. He can always be dangerous from distance and David De Gea should pay close attention.
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