Newcastle 2 Manchester City 1 – Saturday 22 November 2025 5.30pm
A fantastic, fighting performance from Newcastle United exceeded expectations at St James’ Park to secure all three points against a club we had not beaten in the Premier League since Rafa Benitez took charge.
In the first half we went up against the English form team, passmasters and perennial champions.
Barnes could have scored in the opening minute, BNW were thwarted twice by good saves, before Barnes missed the easiest chance of all. In between, Man City missed three big opportunities.
The return of Hall and Livramento for Burn and Trippier has given our creativity and energy a huge boost.
Can we continue to play with intensity and guile in the second half while adding the precision to beat Donnarumma?
To quote Sally when she was pretending with Harry, “YES, YES, YES!” Barnes buried a low shot from the edge of the box after an excellent one-two with Bruno G.
The ecstasy only lasted a few minutes, of course, until we conceded the equalizer from a corner kick.
We came back and seemed to have regained the lead almost immediately, again through a sublime Barnes finish after more good work from Bruno. An agonizing VAR wait ended when the referee confirmed the joyful news. “YES, YES, YES!” There were apparently three possible violations that the Stockley Park team had considered.
The visitors responded with three substitutions and we went to five at the back. Murphy withdrew to replace the exhausted Hall while Botman joined the action. Later, Barnes and BNW were replaced by Elanga and Willock.
Marmoush, once a hat-trick scorer against us, arrived after 85 minutes but had no impact. So did Savinho, who came on for Doku, a player with great skill but a terrible habit of throwing himself to the ground.
Joelinton collected an inevitable booking to break a short break. Yet United held firm under intense pressure. Pope was not severely tested as the 10 teammates around him defended excellently.
There was no man of the match. . . every player in black and white stripes was a hero.
However, a special mention should go to the fit-again Livramento, who ran and ran for more than 100 minutes. Doku tore apart many defenders, but he had almost no fun against our fit full-back.
Newcastle 2 Manchester City 1 – Saturday 22 November 2025 5.30pm
Match statistics
Goals:
Newcastle United:
Barnes 63, 70
Man’s City:
Slide 68
Possess was Newcastle 32% Manchester City 68%
Total shots were Newcastle 9 Man City 17
Shots on target were Newcastle 5 Man City 4
Corners were Newcastle 5 Man City 9
Touches in the opposition box Newcastle 15 Man City 41
Newcastle team vs Man City:
Pope, Livramento, Thiaw, Schar, Hall (Botman 77), Bruno, Joelinton, Tonali, Jacob Murphy, Woltemade (Willock 85), Barnes (Elanga 85)
subtitles:
Ramsdale, Ruddy, Alex Murphy, Neave, Miley, Ramsey
#Newcastle #Manchester #City #Sally #met #Harry