Manchester Metropolis proceed their title problem towards a Newcastle United facet aiming to bounce again from consecutive defeats.
BBC Sport examines a number of the key themes forward of their assembly at St James’ Park.
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Haaland approaches record-breaking century
Manchester Metropolis resume Premier League proceedings following the worldwide break second within the desk and on a run of 4 successive wins in all competitions – their longest such sequence of the present marketing campaign thus far.
Central to Metropolis’s success up to now this season has been the superlative type of striker Erling Haaland, who has scored 30 objectives in his previous 18 video games for membership and nation.
The Norway worldwide continues to shut on yet one more Premier League milestone in report time.
He wants only one objective to achieve his century within the Premier League and will he accomplish that towards Newcastle this weekend, the feat can have been achieved in 15 fewer appearances than every other participant within the competitors’s historical past.
Erling Haaland will attain 100 Premier objectives in a report variety of appearances needs to be rating towards Newcastle this weekend [BBC]
Haaland has scored 14 Premier League objectives in 11 matches in 2025-26 and his ruthless ending has been in full impact, with eight coming by way of a first-time end.
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Whereas Haaland’s wealthy vein of type has been acquainted all through his Metropolis profession, Pep Guardiola’s facet are at the moment bucking the widespread pattern of scoring an elevated quantity of objectives from set-pieces.
Nico Gonzalez’s objective from a nook within the 3-0 Premier League win towards Liverpool forward of the worldwide break was Metropolis’s first from a set-piece this season, the joint lowest tally of any facet, with the Blues as an alternative scoring an unrivalled 22 instances from open play.
Manchester Metropolis and Liverpool have scored the fewest set-piece objectives this season [BBC]
Whether or not it comes from a set-piece or not, any sort of Metropolis objective has usually felt inevitable on this fixture.
They’ve scored in every of their previous 33 Premier League video games towards Newcastle – a contest report by one facet towards the identical opponent.
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Ought to Guardiola’s males rating – and win – at St James’ Park on Saturday, they’ll transfer to inside one level of leaders , who face on Sunday.
Newcastle’s bogey workforce
Newcastle come into this contest making an attempt to recuperate from back-to-back defeats for the primary time this season in a fixture that has proved significantly problematic for Eddie Howe.
Newcastle’s head coach has didn’t win any of his 18 profession Premier League conferences with Metropolis (drawn two, misplaced 16) – the longest such sequence of any Premier League supervisor towards the identical opponent with out ever successful.
If the Magpies are to assist finish Howe’s private purgatory towards his bogey workforce, they need to handle matches higher as soon as forward.
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Newcastle have now misplaced three league video games this season after scoring first, together with their two most up-to-date defeats.
That they had beforehand misplaced three video games after opening the scoring throughout the whole thing of the previous two seasons.
Newcastle’s dwelling type
Nonetheless, the Magpies are on a powerful run of dwelling type, successful their previous 5 matches at St James’ Park in all competitions, scoring 11 objectives and conserving 4 clear sheets.
Summer time signing Nick Woltemade has scored in three of his 4 dwelling league appearances up to now and continues to develop into Premier League soccer, with all three of his open-play objectives coming from first-time pictures.
The 23-year-old additionally scored three objectives for Germany throughout the worldwide window in wins towards Luxembourg and Slovakia.