Newcastle v Arsenal: Premier League – live

The teams are out. They’re dressed exactly as Winston O’Boogie had it. We’ll be off in a couple of minutes. “G’Day Scott,” begins Chris Paraskevas. “Arsenal at St. James’ Park has brought with it the inevitable flood of Dennis Bergkamp x Nikos Dabizas clips on social media. And by x I mean Bergkamp turning Nikos into a literal and metaphorical lamb on the spit, rotating him so fast he ended up somewhere in the Golden Age of Pericles. Here’s hoping for a new highlight of someone in black and white accidentally-but-on-purpose-Cruyff-Turning their marker en route to goal. I love Bergkamp but it’s becoming a bit of an insult to Euro 2004 winner Nikos, not that I’m biased or anything.”

The Beatles have made one or two headlines this week. It’s fitting that these two clubs meet a couple of days after the release of Now and Then, given they both feature on the cover of another 1970s John Lennon artefact, Walls and Bridges.

Mikel Arteta’s turn. “[Martin Odegaard] is not fit and we cannot play him … he is our captain and a really important player but it is an opportunity for another one to stand up and have a great performance … I am really proud of [Eddie Nketiah, who makes his 100th Premier League appearance tonight] and what he has achieved … it is going to be a beautiful game.”

Eddie Howe talks to Sky Sports. “Arsenal are a very good team … we’re in good form and confident after recent games … it’s set up to be a really interesting game … the players were brilliant in midweek … now we have to come back to the Premier League and every game is so difficult … Arsenal are unbeaten and will be a good test for us … we have to implement what we want to do and be a threat.”

Arsenal can go top of the table if they win here tonight. They’d need to beat Newcastle by six goals to do it, mind, after Manchester City thrashed Bournemouth 6-1 earlier.

Newcastle meanwhile have dropped a couple of places as a result Brighton’s 1-1 draw at Everton and Manchester United’s 1-0 victory at Fulham. They can get back to sixth with a draw this evening.

There seems little point comparing Newcastle’s starting XI to the free-jazz collection of full-backs Eddie Howe sent out at Old Trafford in the League Cup. More instructive, rather, to check today’s line-up against last week’s Premier League selection at Wolves. No changes!

Let’s take a similar approach with Arsenal, who also indulged in a spot of League Cup experimentation during the week. They’ve made three changes to their last Premier League starting XI. Of the team that began the 5-0 thrashing of Sheffield United, Jakub Kiwior, Oleksandr Zinchenko and Emile Smith Rowe make way; Gabriel, Tomiyasu and Jorginho come in.

Newcastle United: Pope, Trippier, Schar, Lascelles, Burn, Bruno Guimaraes, Longstaff, Joelinton, Almiron, Wilson, Gordon.
Subs: Dubravka, Dummett, Ritchie, Krafth, Hall, Livramento, Murphy, Willock, Miley.

Arsenal: Raya, White, Saliba, Gabriel, Tomiyasu, Rice, Jorginho, Havertz, Saka, Nketiah, Martinelli.
Subs: Ramsdale, Kiwior, Cedric, Trossard, Vieira, Nelson, Elneny, Hein, Zinchenko.

Referee: Stuart Attwell (Warwickshire).

Newcastle United have lost eight of their last ten Premier League matches against Arsenal. They’ve failed to score in eight of those ten games. They’ve lost 19 of the last 22 in all competitions, the most recent defeat a 0-2 reverse in May just gone. History favours Arsenal strongly … but then Newcastle United had only won once at Old Trafford in over half a century before Wednesday night, and look what happened there. So this is set up nicely between two of English football’s upwardly mobile teams. Kick-off is at 5.30pm GMT. It’s on!