Aston Villa vs Newcastle United 26/11/19

26 November 2019

Aston Villa and Newcastle United go head-to-head in the Premier League (PL) bottom-of-the-table clash at Villa Park.

After losing three consecutive PL games, the hosts have slipped to 17th in the table, only three points clear of the relegation zone. Poor second-half performers, the returnees have conceded six goals after the break across those three failures, scoring only once. But, before succumbing 2-1 to Liverpool in their last PL home outing, the Villans put together four straight league home games without a loss (W2, D2), netting precisely two goals per match on three of those occasions. Dean Smith’s players tend to break their rivals down before halftime, having scored inside the first 45 minutes in four of five of their previous PL home matches. But, Villa’s leaky defense has already conceded over 1.5 match goals in three of six PL home games so far.

Meanwhile, the visitors have won back-to-back league games ahead of this trip, both of which have seen them prevail by a single-goal margin. The Magpies have scored five goals across those two victories, which is one less than they managed in the opening ten PL fixtures (6). Unable to build fluidly in the final third, Steve Bruce’s men hold the second joint-worst goalscoring record in England’s top-tier competition. Another massive problem for the traveling side is that they’ve conceded 14 of their total 18 PL goals away from home (77.77%). But, a consolation for Newcastle is that they have avoided defeat in their previous five top-flight trips to Villa Park (W2, D3), keeping a clean sheet in the last two.