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Amazon Prime have live coverage of this one, hence the early-ish kick-off time. Probably just as well this one starts a bit earlier, because TNT have decided to bag the Merseyside derby, which of course means we are on at Saturday lunchtime for that one. Newcastle have had a middling start to the season, which means there are a fair few fans calling for Howe’s head. With the ownership regime’s appalling history with human rights, that is a sinister call. Mind you, if they do get rid of Howe (via the more humane approach of sacking him obviously!), they’ll also be getting shut of that gobshite Tindall, so there’s that. Isak has been their main source of goals so when he’s not firing (or is absent through injury, which is a possibility for this game), they have struggled for goals. Barnes has been keeping up with Isak, but others such as Gordon and Wilson haven’t yet found their form of the last couple of years. Tonali is back in the fold after his gambling-related absence, and they still have Guimaraes, but they might also have reached the point where Howe can’t take them any further. This will not the game for them to get their shit into gear. Since the Saudi royal family’s sovereign wealth fund purchased the club, it has been noticeable that they haven’t exactly gone all out throwing money around like expected. People thought it would be like City on steroids or the Russian gangster at Chelsea but they’ve been more cautious. Due to needing to meet PSR restrictions, their summer transfer spending was all about financial chicanery between all the other clubs affected. So they spent a fortune on goalkeeper Vlachodimos from Forest and defender Hall from Chelsea. Forest signed Anderson for a ridiculous amount in return. These clubs did these deals only to be able to book the full (and over-inflated) transfer fee for the sale, and amortise the transfer fee for incoming signings over 5 years. Anyway, enough about them. For us, we need to continue riding the recent wave that has seen us open up a 9-point lead in the league, as well as maintain a 100% record in Europe. All of that has come about through hard work and an absence of complacency, as well as being wary of what our opponents can bring. We need to be mindful of the possibility of the Geordies putting a lot more into this game in an attempt to get themselves back on track, so guarding against allowing that to happen as well as doing all the things we’ve done so well up to this point is key. It’s likely we’ll have the same squad as for the City game. Harvey returned to action for that one as a late sub. Ali, Diogo and Ibou aren’t ready to return yet. Kostas was apparently walking around on crutches today, which is a bummer. No word on when Fede will finally be ready to return. He’s been involved in training sessions for weeks now. I get that we want him to get used to Slot’s system and English football, and we want to manage his physical workload to avoid another injury, but he must be good for late cameos if we’ve put the result to bed. We’ll see I guess. How have our previous managers got on in their first away fixture against the Geordies? To my mind, we generally do pretty well up there so it’s a bit surprising to see how poor we’ve been when our manager first travels up to St James’ Park. Hopefully Slot continues to buck trends like this one. Souness...21/11/1993...Newcastle 3-0 Liverpool Evans...24/09/1994...Newcastle 1-1 Liverpool (Rush) Houllier...26/12/1999...Newcastle 2-2 Liverpool (Owen 2) Benitez...05/03/2005...Newcastle 1-0 Liverpool Hodgson...11/12/2010...Newcastle 3-1 Liverpool (Kuyt) Dalglish...01/04/2012...Newcastle 2-0 Liverpool Rodgers...23/04/2013...Newcastle 0-6 Liverpool (Agger, Henderson 2, Sturridge 2, Borini) Klopp...06/12/2015...Newcastle 2-0 Liverpool I don't ask for much. Maximum motivation, control, application, attitude and concentration from minute one. 3 points please. Get it done!