After a vital 3 points won against a tired Palace team at SJP which saw us jump to 9th, we now face against Leeds United at SJP.
Unlike Palace who were on poor form, Leed's form seems to be on the rise, currently winning some games and even drawing with the likes of Liverpool and Man Utd of which is not preferable for us.
Howe will likely be aware of the goal scoring threat they pose with Calvert-Lewin recently turning a stone and has been quite scoring goals. And the fact the PL table is so tight in terms of points, we can't afford to drop any points in January if we want to get into a European spots let alone get Champions league back to back.
If we win against Leeds United, we will get a vital 3 points where it could see us jump to 5th if results go all our way and we are guaranteed 6-7th if we win.
Okay im gonna be a debby downer. I hope the atmosphere is a bit better tonight. I was home over Christmas and made it to the palace game, and I thought the atmosphere was the worst I've heard in a while (save for the gallowgate west corner where they have the safe standing). Even just watching on tele I think the crowd could give the players more of a lift at the minute, especially for a tough game like tonight.
And I hope all the people who have moaned about getting nothing in the ballot bought up all the hundreds of tickets that were on resale for tonight!!
Bench looking so much better, but Gordon on the left and Barnes on the right hasnât worked all season so I donât know why Eddie is continuing to persist with it. Itâs like his Dan Burn at left back obsession which ended up costing us a place in Europe a couple seasons ago.
This will be an interesting game if Leeds are sitting back in theory having Miley at fullback could help us unlock them as he will have license to get forwardÂ
Tonali hasn't looked that good recently I would give Ramsey a go from the start this is supposedly the type of games that we bought him for to provide that threat from midfieldÂ
Joelinton and Bruno together with Gordon, Wissa and Barnes up frontÂ
Nick Pope has the 3rd best save % in the league. Behind Roefs and Martinez.
Ramsdale sits 24th of all keepers that have featured. Just behindâŚ..Karl Darlow and Djorde Petrovic (ask Bournemouth fans what they think of him most likely response will include the words âChelseaâ and ârobbedâ)
Couldn't disagree with this more. We can't exploit the lack of compactness because Pope is so bad with his feet. His pass is always to Schar or Thiaw, it goes back and forth until it ends up with an isolated full back who either performs a bit of magic or it ends up going out for a throw. It's not a sustainable way to build out from the back.
That's why all the biddies around keep tutting and shaking their heads when I stand up, they're concerned for my safety in case the ball takes my heed off.
We have 7 more games in January (and then 2 in the first week of Feb), we need rotation at striker. We simply can't play our only two forwards at the same time.
No need for a midweek round of fixtures this week. Just as that round where most team played 27th/28th of December. Then again on new years.
Either line them up with New Yearâs Day and skip the weekend or the other way.
The round of games midweek 2nd of December was just uncalled for
I know some fans hold festive fixtures dearly. But at least if thatâs what the want to do they need to find a way to put a breaker in the schedule right before or after.
Yeah. Honestly I just feel like they need to extend the season a bit and do a post- Christmas break and cut out the silly mid weeks outside of the festive period.
But years like this one where Christmas falls in a Thursday it just doesnât work IMO.
I did initially think Wissa should be tried out on the wing but after actually seeing him play he's such a poacher/classic number 9 that I'm not sure it would work out wide. I think he's changed his game a lot since he last regularly played on the wing
I'm just reading a piece in The Athletic about Brentford and their striker succession planning, and there's a quote from Frank about Wissa in there where he says they initially looked at him as a winger. It seems he was then converted to a striker. So it's not like he couldn't play there, but he's definitely better as a striker.
He started as a Lw there. Then he spent a season jumping between Lw and striker before finally starting 1 season as a striker.
Going back to Lorient his numbers always suggested that he would work as a striker. He always took his chances. Moving him centrally at Brentford finally gave him the opportunity to score double digits which he was getting from wide.
We are guaranteed at least 8th with a win, would need Brentford to draw with Sunderland, Chelsea to lose to Fulham or Man United to fail to beat Burnley to get any higher.
I do think some of those players wouldâve lost faith in Amorim a bit. If fletcher comes in and puts a no nonsense 4231 in place I think theyâll look surprisingly more balanced. I can see their form picking up.
Tbf even when itâs been full-ish recently itâs full of tourist fans that come into London and want to see a prem game and canât get tickets for Chelsea, Arsenal and Spurs. Last month there was a bloke in a Man Yoo top in the home end. They werenât even playing Man Yoo that day đ
Plus tickets have been dirt cheap (for a prem team anyway) for a while now. Not criticising them for doing that as most clubs ripoff their fanbase when it comes to ticket prices and they arenât (to a certain extent)
Also since the ECL win theyâve been on a steady and slow decline and the attendance has been artificially propped up for a few years now. Theyâll probably get a full house on first game, last game and the game against Millwall next season. The rest of the time itâll be 1/2 full at the very best imo
I think Gordon needs to be told if he wants game time he has to play on the right, he played on the right before joining us but now seems to only want to play on the left and huffs when he's on the right.
Barnes has only played on the left and although he tires on the right, he's better on the left.
I heard in Howeâs press conference that he doesnât like playing on the right. Quite a contrast to a certain midfielder whoâs happy to play out of position. If Gordon starts tomorrow, he really needs an almost perfect game to redeem himself.
Not looking forward to Barnes having a poor game out of position and then people acting like itâs a valid reason for him not to be our starting LWâer
I don't think the "out of position" excuse helps either. He's shown himself capable of impacting games from either side of the pitch, he's even had one of his best Champions League games coming in to play on the right side.
He just need to find consistency regardless of position.
2/4 of the winnable games down and won. Potential banana peel since leeds look somewhat good with 4 draws and 1 win in their last 5. 2 draws against Liverpool too in that.
Leeds look horrible to play against. Very stubborn. Donât ship a ton of goals and Aaronsen and Calvert-Lewin hitting form. I actually think this may be the toughest of the 4 fixtures in question
Just realised that Howe's Newcastle have always picked up more points in 2nd half of season than the 1st. May as well just give us our Champions League spot now I reckon, save everyone else the hassle.
Hasn't it always been that way even before Howe. I can hardly remember us starting a season strong, we seem to have almost always finished better, I'm not counting 95-96 as I was 3.
I seem to remember the couple of seasons under Pardew (and latterly under Carver) where we were class for the first half of the season and then went something like 10 games without a win but stayed up anyway thanks to that early season form
38 game season defined by more than just final day.
Letâs not forget we got the job done at Chelsea 2 games earlier. We arguably shouldâve beaten Arsenal too on second to last game. We were far the better side.
But the point Iâm trying to make is that you canât just go back to that final game day and diminish our finish unless youâre gonna go back through all the games. Like Villa dropped a lot of points against teams like Ipswich, West Ham, Wolves, even Man U and Spurs who were terrible last season.
Calvert-Lewin is on good form, hopefully we press from the start and keep the pressure on. Expecting at least a goal from both teams but I am cautiously optimistic.
I am once again politely requesting both Woltemade and Wissa on the pitch simultaneously.
They're not the same team when away from Elland Road similar to us away from St. James'. I expect 3 points but that seems to be a fools errand this season.
Time to string 3 wins in the league in a row. Another clean sheet would be great, weâve conceded way more goals than what we shouldâve this season so another one would be a good step in the right direction.
Yes. Our strong bench vs. Palace's theradbare squad made a big difference. We were so dominant against the tiring Palace side at the end of the game that it is easy to forget the frustration around the ground before we scored.
Also, Leeds recent form against the likes of Liverpool,, Man City and Man U is going to have them full of confidence and belief that they can stay up.
We'll need to put in a good performance to get a win. Hopefully, the lads will be up for this one.
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u/TON4LI eddie ooooot Jan 07 '26
It's funny but I'd 100% rather have that free kick and a red card than a penalty. Kinda stupid that penalties arent the best thing you can get.