Back Newcastle to register a routine home victory over struggling Bristol City on Saturday.
Newcastle v Bristol City - Saturday 15:00
The visit of Bristol City represents the calm before the storm for Newcastle, their next three games all away from home against the three teams immediately below them in the table. It’s a crunch eight-day period for the Magpies and one they must negotiate without Dwight Gayle, who suffered a recurrence of his hamstring injury in the midweek 2-0 success over Aston Villa.
So it’s imperative they take maximum points from this game, the scoreline is largely irrelevant. Ideally, the Toon would like to keep something back for that first hurdle at Brighton in front of the Sky cameras on Tuesday, knowing that a positive result on the south coast sets them up nicely for subsequent trips to Huddersfield and Reading.
As a veteran of much bigger title races in his time, Rafa Benitez will appreciate the delicacy of the process, whereby each wrong move increases the probability of another one next time out. Expect a high uncertainty avoidance approach from the Spaniard against a struggling Robins outfit and back the Newcastle 2-0 correct score at 7/1.
Lee Johnson is treading on thin ice at Ashton Gate and his position only became more precarious following the 2-0 home defeat to Fulham in midweek. For him, there’s an obvious temptation to play this game ultra-cautiously also. Nobody expects him to win at St James’s Park. A narrow defeat buys him a stay of execution, whereas a heavy defeat maybe costs him his job.
