We look ahead to Saturday’s Premier League clash at St James’ Park with our Newcastle United vs Manchester City prediction and preview. Will Erling Haaland score his 100th Premier League goal in record time?
Newcastle vs Manchester City: The Key Stats
Newcastle have lost their last two league games, and that is expected to become three straight defeats, with Manchester City the Opta supercomputer’s favourites (43.7%).
Erling Haaland is one goal away from hitting 100 in the Premier League, and will smash Newcastle legend Alan Shearer’s record for the quickest players to their century if he scores here.
City have won 12 Premier League away games against Newcastle, their joint-most away victories against an opponent in the competition.
Erling Haaland’s incredible goalscoring form continued over the international break.
He netted twice in the space of 90 seconds as Norway stormed to a 4-1 win over Italy last week, just three days after scoring a quickfire double against Estonia.
Haaland has played 15 times for Manchester City in all competitions this season, and has failed to score in only two of them, in defeats to Tottenham Hotspur and Aston Villa.
The 25-year-old already has 19 goals to his name in all competitions, with 14 of those coming in the Premier League, almost twice as many as the division’s next-highest scorer (Igor Thiago, eight).
His next strike in the Premier League will see him hit 100 in England’s top flight. He has played just 108 times in the competition. The current record holder for the fastest player to 100 Premier League goals is Alan Shearer, who needed 124 matches to get there.
Erling Haaland 100 Goals Record
Fittingly, then, Haaland could well shatter the record at Shearer’s former stomping ground, St James’ Park, on Saturday, as Pep Guardiola’s team head to Newcastle United.
City’s emphatic 3-0 win over Liverpool last time out closed the gap on Premier League leaders Arsenal to four points. With the Gunners not in action until they face rivals Spurs on Sunday, Guardiola will be licking his lips at the chance to really apply the pressure.
This time last year, City’s capitulation began, but they are now rediscovering their rhythm, even if they have been extremely reliant on Haaland’s goals. No other City player has scored more than one league goal this season, with Haaland responsible for 14 of their 21 strikes in the top tier (66.7%).
Haaland’s record goal chase
So, stop Haaland, and perhaps you stop City. But that’s easier said than done. A goal in this match would be the third earliest (by date) a Premier League player has reached 20 goals in all competitions in a campaign, after Andrew Cole in 1993-94 (21 November) and Haaland himself in 2022-23 (8 October).
But if there is a defence that could be set up to have some success against City’s fearsome number nine, then Newcastle’s have a good shout.
Only City (10.4) and Arsenal (6.1) can boast a lower expected goals against (xGA) figure than Newcastle (11.4) in the Premier League this season; Eddie Howe’s team have also kept five clean sheets, which ranks joint-second, behind Arsenal’s seven.
Newcastle xGA
It has been up the other end that Newcastle have had issues. Nick Woltemade has made a bright start to life, but with Yoane Wissa injured and Anthony Gordon in blunt form, goals have been hard to come by. The Magpies have scored just 11 times in the league, which ranks above only Wolves (seven), Leeds United (10) and Nottingham Forest (10).
Newcastle have underperformed their 13.2 xG, but City have not had that issue. They are the division’s leading scorers (23 goals) and have the second-highest xG (19.5).
City lost two of their first three Premier League games this season (W1), conceding four goals in the process. Since then, they have lost just one of their last eight (W6 D1), conceding just another four goals in this run.
Newcastle, however, are languishing in 14th place, only two points above the bottom three, on the back of successive 3-1 defeats to Brentford and West Ham.
The Magpies took the lead in both of those matches. In fact, Newcastle have lost three Premier League games despite scoring first this season. It is as many such defeats as they had suffered in the previous two campaigns combined (one in 2024-25, 2 in 2023-24), while they last lost more in 2021-22 (four).
Newcastle have never lost three straight Premier League matches in which they have taken the lead, while they last suffered more than two successive top-flight defeats back in January 2024, when they lost four in a row.
Newcastle vs Manchester City Head-to-Head
Newcastle have won just one of their last 35 Premier League meetings with Manchester City (D6 L28), a 2-1 home win in January 2019 under Rafael Benítez.
City have won 12 Premier League away games against Newcastle, their joint-most away victories against an opponent in the competition (also 12 vs Everton).
City have scored in each of their last 33 Premier League games against Newcastle. Only three sides have had a longer scoring streak against an opponent in top-flight history – Chelsea vs Newcastle (37 from 1933-1969), Tottenham vs Newcastle (35 from 1922-1961) and Everton vs Blackburn (34 from 1925-1962).
Howe, meanwhile, has won none of his 18 Premier League meetings with City (D2 L16) – it’s the most a manager has faced an opponent in the competition without ever winning.
Newcastle vs Manchester City Prediction
The Opta supercomputer is not forecasting a clear favourite, but City are given a healthy 43.7% chance of victory.
Newcastle came out on top in 31.1% of the model’s 10,000 data-led sims, while the chance of a draw is coming in at 25.2%.
Newcastle vs Man City Prediction
Newcastle vs Manchester City Predicted Lineups
Newcastle United: Aaron Ramsdale, Kieran Trippier, Malick Thiaw, Sven Botman, Lewis Hall, Bruno Guimarães, Sandro Tonali, Jacob Ramsey, Jacob Murphy, Harvey Barnes, Nick Woltemade.
Manager: Eddie Howe
Manchester City: Gianluigi Donnarumma, Matheus Nunes, Rúben Dias, Josko Gvardiol, Nico O’Reilly, Bernardo Silva, Nico González, Phil Foden, Rayan Cherki, Jérémy Doku, Erling Haaland.
Manager: Pep Guardiola
Opta Power Rankings
The Opta Power Rankings are a global team ranking system. They assign an ability score to over 15,000 domestic football teams. This score is on a scale between zero and 100, where zero is the worst-ranked team in the world and 100 is the best team in the world.
Ahead of kick-off on Saturday at St James’ Park, here is the Opta Power Ranking for both sides.
Premier League Stats Opta
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