Cardiff City v Newcastle United

Cardiff City Away

The Cardiff Stadium

Sunday 13th September Kick-off 2:05pm

Sixth Championship Game of the season

Cardiff have Michael Chopra ex Mag and leading goalscorer in he Championship playing for them. Newcastle enter the weekend top of the league by two points with West Brom and Cardiff chasing them.

Injuries to key forward players means that we will most likely play the favoured 4-5-1 formation away from home again, as we did so succesffully at Crystal Palace last time out. Nile Ranger will start as new loan signing Peter Lovenkrands regains his fitness, having missed any pre-season training or match practice. Andy Carroll was close to returning however, he failed the final fitness test on Friday and remains injured. Shola Ameobi starts his two months recovery from a stress fracture of the foot.

Chris Hughton picked up manage of the month award and Shola Ameobi picked up player of the month award in the Coca-Cola Championship for August. Let's hope the usually drop in form does not follow the award winners.

Nicky Butt return to captain the midfield having recovered from his pre-season injury, and Alan Smith the bearded wonder, has stated he will not shave again until Newcastle lose.

Finally Newcastle protect a goalmouth that has not seen a goal for the last 360 minutes in the League. Steve Harper and the back four will be well tested by Chopra and Bothroyd.

Tickets

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Squad:

Newcastle Squad:

Steve Harper, Tim Krul, Danny Simpson, Nicky Butt (c), Jose Enrique, Steven Taylor, Fabricio Coloccini, Joey Barton, Kevin Nolan, Alan Smith, Geremi, Kazenga LuaLua, Tamas Kadar, Nile Ranger, Ben Tozer, Ryan Donaldson, Darren Lough, Wesley Ngo Baheng, Haris Vuckic, Peter Lovenkrands

Injuries:

Shola Ameobi (foot), Andy Carroll (groin), Jonas Gutierrez (Hamstring)

Referee:

Andrew Hall (West Midlands)

Chris Hughton Comments

talking to The Chronicle

“I’m expecting a really tough game, probably our toughest. That’s no disrespect to anybody else we’ve played, but you always focus on the next task in hand, which for us is Cardiff City. I know they have been very good at their new stadium and that their fans will demand a performance from their players. That is another factor, but for our players it’s a chance to play in a great atmosphere. Our approach will be to continue what we’ve already demonstrated in previous games.

Spirits in training have been very high. It was normal to give the players a couple of days off. Their routine has been interrupted because of the international break. But some of them have had their breather and are ready to go again. It seems quite a while ago since we played last, but obviously we are going all out to keep this great run going.”

on Size of Squad talking to nufcTV

"We're aware that we need to strengthen this squad and we're very hopeful of doing that. We've done very well so far and have avoided serious injury problems, but we definitely need to bring a couple of players in in certain areas."

Dave Jones Cardiff Manager Said

"They're a Premier League football club in this division,I think this is one of the biggest league games this football club has had for many a year because of who we are playing.

Everybody wrote them off - the so-called experts not the people within the game. They knew they had good players and the staff know their players because they've been there a while.

Nobody expected them to be as bad as what the experts were saying, because players have a lot of pride and 44,000 fans that turn up won't allow them to go out on to the pitch and not perform. Hopefully we can get the result we are all looking for. We are playing a very, very tough side who are top of the league. They will want to stay there but we want to knock them off and get with them."

Head to Head

Toon @ Cardiff:

• 2003/04 Won 3-1 Ameobi, Taggard (og), Jenas
• 1983/84 won 2-0 Keegan, Beardsley
• 1981/82 won 4-0 Varadi 3, Davies(pen)
• 1980/81 lost 0-1
• 1979/80 drew 1-1 Shinton
• 1978/79 lost 1-2 Connolly
• 1964/65 drew 1-1 Cummings
• 1963/64 drew 2-2 Cummings, McGarry(pen)
• 1962/63 drew 4-4 Fell(pen), Kerray, Hilley, og
• 1960/61 lost 2-3 Allchurch, White

Recent Results

Steven Taylor on Michael Chopra

talking to The Chronicle

“He’s (Chopra) a very good finisher, but if we perform like we have been doing, I don’t see them scoring a goal. It’s down to us as players to stop that happening. Every game’s different – we’ll have to wait and see. I look forward to every challenge in every game, not just Michael Chopra. He’s done well scoring his goals, but we’ll hopefully put a stop to that. It’ll be a physical game. We’ll give their players respect, but not too much.

The clean sheets have helped – I think it’s a long time since Newcastle have had that. This is the tightest we’ve been as a team, and the performances have shown that. We taken confidence and belief from every game. Teams might come to St James’s Park thinking we’re a soft touch with us coming down from the Premier League. We try to send a message out early doors by attacking teams – we don’t sit off any more.

It (Cardiff) is a very hostile, and we know what to expect off their fans. As players we love that – we thrive on it, and it won’t affect any of us. We’ve got to attack teams and we’re fit enough to do that. We’ve got enough players and ability to play three games in a week.”

Kevin Nolan Tales from Janauary

talking to The Times he said:

“From the first day we got back in training, Chris didn’t know what was going on and he brought us together and told us that. 

He said, ‘I don’t know if I’ll be here next week and neither do you. Half the lads in this room could be gone’. You’ve got to take your hat off to the man for saying that he is just one huge, genuine fella.”

“What we are is a decent bunch of lads who are trying our best and the fans have taken to us. We are getting some respect back and if we can get back into the Barclays Premier League, we have such a good core of lads that you’d only have to bring in five or six players and you could continue to build.

“No disrespect, but we could end up like a Leeds, Charlton or Southampton unless we get things right. The club has been at the top for a long time, but it doesn’t mean if you spend a lot of money on the best players, you have a divine right to be in the Premier League. We proved that last year. Now it’s about us making sure we get back up there.

“I’ve been a part of some great dressing rooms at Bolton, and most of the time that gets you results. You can come away from a Manchester United or a Liverpool with a 0-0 draw. When I first came here, I thought ‘we never, ever get scrappy 0-0s away from home, or win 1-0 at home despite playing badly’. That never happened. That’s what I’ve found in the last six months.

“After we went down, we all sat around a table and asked ourselves, ‘where do we want to go?’ We all agreed that while we are here, we have to give 110 per cent. We said, ‘anyone who wants to leave, tell us now and you can go’. But everyone stuck their hand up and said ‘no – we want to be a part of this’. It has brought us tighter together.

“We have even had Championship managers who have never been in the Premier League slating us. It’s been laughable. So every time we play against those teams it will be in the back of our heads. We’ve just say to ourselves, ‘let’s prove them wrong’.

“I still can’t believe that Newcastle are in the Championship, but we are. When we lost against Aston Villa and were relegated, I went out with my dad on the Monday and had a few pints. We had a talk and I said, ‘I still can’t believe it’. All the players were devastated.

“He said, ‘What are you going to do, son?’ I said, ‘I’m going to get us back up as quickly as possible’. The only thing that matters to me is what goes on in the dressing room, nothing else. Everyone in there wants to come to work.”

“I had a few good years at Bolton, but that’s gone now. This year is all about trying to prove that I am a Premier League player and that I deserve to be there. We’ve started well, but we’ve not proved anything yet. We can only prove things at the end of the season. The only time I can say I deserve to be a Premier League player again is when we get back there. I was part of the team that took us down, and nobody thinks they deserve to be in the Premier League in our dressing-room right now. They need to prove it.

“You don’t ever win titles or anything in the first month of the season. We’ve made a great start, but there is so long to go. We have to prove ourselves again and again and again.

“There is something in the dressing room this season. I think it is going to be very hard to break us. Hopefully, I’m right. All the staff have been brilliant, even though they haven’t really known whether they are coming or going. There has been some mayhem this summer, I’d agree. But the lads have just got down to work.

“You can’t have an ego if you’ve just been relegated from the Premier League. No one can blame anyone else, because we’ve all been a part of that team. Some people say, ‘You’re not to blame’, but I was the one that got sent off against Everton and I played ten games or so after I came here in January. So I was a major part of what happened last season.

“I’ve told the players that we will always be remembered as the players that took Newcastle out of the Premier League. After we had come back after the summer, I said to them, ‘Now, we can be remembered as the players that took the club back’. That is my view of where we are at.”

“I just admire them (the fans) for the loyalty they’ve shown the club and the passion they bring. We have to thank the fans every day for their support. We’re averaging over 40,000 and we sell out every away ground wherever we go. That’s the way these fanatical fans are.

“Sam Allardyce at Bolton said, ‘If you can’t do it for yourself, do it for your family’. But when you come up here, you can add the fans to that list as well. They work hard to come and watch us and to try to have a good weekend and they’ve probably not had many of those for a while. Hopefully, in the last month, they’ve had something to smile about. I hope things get sorted and we can get this great football club back to where it belongs.”

Fun Facts

• Newcastle are aiming to complete five league wins in a row for the first time since April 2006
• The Magpies' return of 13 points from a first possible 15 is their best start to a league season in 15 years
• If Geremi is named in the 11, it will be the former Chelsea player's 150th start for an English club.
• Newcastle did the double over Cardiff in the last two seasons they were in the same division - 1981/82 and 1983/84.
• The Bluebirds last beat Newcastle in February 1981.