Highlights of the first of Newcastle United’s first pre season friendly games, this one against German third string side Chemnitzer, at their place, Der Stadion an der Gellertstraße, Chemnitz.
A mostly second string Magpies eleven (with a few big names coming on before the end) succumbed to a solitary goal from Chemnitzer’s Anton Fink in the tenth minute. Sammy Ameobi thought he had levelled later in the game but he was judged to be offside.
New kids on the block, Romain Amalfitano and Gael Bigirimana both took part, with Amalfitano starting and Bigirimana coming on as a sub for for Mehdi Abeid in the 70th minute. The highly talented Haris Vuckic also managed to play 70 minutes of the game without breaking something!
Congratulations to the Newcastle United youth team players on winning the Hong Kong “Soccer Sevens” seven a side Championship in er, Hong Kong.
It was the first time Magpies had participted in the competition, and after beating Celtic and Blunderland on their path of glory, they triumphed 2-1 over a team of young Aston Villans in the final. Midfielder, Brad Inman, in particular seemed to have a very good game, assisting Adam Campbell’s opening goal for the Mags before banging one in himself.
If you want to see the Toon stars of the future, look no further!(more…)
Yaya Double TroubleVenue: St James’ Park. Date: Sun 06th May 2012. Kick-Off: 1:30pm. Referee: Howard Webb.
On a day that United unveiled a statue of the late great Sir Bobby Robson, Manchester City were in town desperate for a win to keep their title hopes alive.
United were also in need of a win to keep our Champions League aspirations going, so the scene was set for a titanic battle between two of the best teams in the English Premier League, with both sets of fans able to point to players capable of winning the game.
There was a pre-match scare with Tim Krul having a hand injury but relief when the teams were announced and Krul’s name was there. Not many United fans would have wanted to go into this game without our Dutch keeper, who Alan Pardew reckons has won us at least 12 points this season on his own.
First Half
Cheick Tiote started the game with 8 stitches in his head and it was a bit of a concern early on when he overhit his first couple of passes. Was he affected by the head wound or maybe he’d eaten too many shredded wheat. Anyway the good news is that he settled down as the match went on. The first six minutes were cat and mouse with the only highlight being Cabaye’s boot unintentionally colliding with Barry’s face – sadly for Barry, the event didn’t improve his looks. (more…)
A view from the bridge.Walking into Stamford Bridge on Wednesday evening, chatting to Chelsea fans, it was plain to see that they seemed to think Newcastle were only there to make up the numbers.
But I had a good feeling about the game as we went through the various security checks and finally into the Shed (lower level gate 1). We found our seats then turned our attention to drinks. But this isn’t Ashburton Grove (Goonersville) and it was disappointing to say the least that nothing alcoholic was allowed or even for sale. Weird!
Anyhoo,
The guy with the mic walked onto the pitch to start the crowd ‘wind up’.
It was good to see that Alan Pardew put a good attacking team out. Danny Simpson didn’t make the team through injury but I wasn’t worried by the inclusion of James Perch at right back, as he’s shown us how he’s come on this season recently and was once again a stand out performer. (more…)
Cisse does it again, in style.Newcastle United keep their Champions League – or, at least, 4th place – hopes alive after beating Chelsea 2-0 at Stamford Bridge to go level on points with Spurs.
It was a sedate start to things at Stamford Bridge although Torres caused a bit of concern by standing shoulder to shoulder with our defence and taking care not to fall foul of the offside trap. In doing so, he managed to set Meireles up for a shot that went sky-high and then got away from our defenders to run into the box himself, but he was driven wide by the advancing Krul and the attack came to nothing.
Sedate it may have been but Tiote still managed to pick up a yellow card in under 4 minutes for clumsily bringing down Torres a few yards outside our box. Fortunately the resulting free kick was hit straight to Krul.
Our first meaningful attack came when Santon made a run up the left, cut inside and tried to take a shot, although it was blocked by the defender in front of him. Shortly after that Tiote seemed to be flirting with danger when he brought Ramires down but fortunately the ref just had a quite word with him. (more…)
