After the direct promotion of Brighton & Hove Albion, now Newcastle Utd will try to achieve that. They lost the first place but not the battle for the second place. Of course, there are still three more rounds and nothing is so clear but the team of the head coach Rafael Benitez will do anything in order to promote themselves and play in the Premier League again, after they relegated last year.
Currently Newcastle are second in the Championship as they are 6 points ahead from the third Reading. They can be very happy that Reading did not manage to win on Saturday against Nottingham and now they have miserable chances of getting to the direct promotion. Tonight, the team from the Newcastle will be looking for just one point in the game against Preston in order to qualify for the Premier League next season. It will be interesting, whether Rafael Benitez will be looking for the win tonight or he will play only for the point so they can be promoted. We think that the second place is not that valued for them as they will wish to win the Championship. It is more prestigious and they will try to revenge to their rivals from Brighton.
After all, at the moment it does not look very good as all the chances are on the side of Brighton. The team from the South England lost their last game against Norwich away from home, but this is not changing anything as the situation remains still the same. Brighton are 7 points above Newcastle and even with an eventual win tonight they will be still far on the top. But as you know this is an English football and nothing is sure till the end of the season. Newcastle spent lots of money for this promotion and the board will not be satisfied with the second place, yes, it is a promotion but it is not good enough for their ambitions and aims before the season. There is a big chance even Rafael Benitez to be changed if they did not manage to win the Championship title.
The regular forward of Newcastle Utd Dwight Gayle is not going to play tonight against the team of Preston as he is still with a muscle injury. Curtis Good is injured too but he is not a regular player so he will not be a big miss tonight. The main problems will come from one of the best defenders – Ciaran Clark who might not be ready for this game and probably there is a big possibility even not be in the substitutions. As for Preston the only unavailable player is Alex Baptiste who got red card in the last game against Norwich and he will miss this game.
We believe that Newcastle United will have no problems in winning this game. They might even win with difference but they must play good and concentrated because Preston are coming here after three consecutive losses and they will be very motivated to achieve the victory. After all, we do not believe that we are going to see a surprise here and we strongly recommend to play this game for Newcastle, which team is a clear favourite in our eyes.
