FA Cup 3rd round preview - Stevenage v Newcastle.

Newcastle kick off their FA Cup campaign against Stevenage Borough tomorrow evening, and they will surely be hoping that events run a lot more smoothly than they did the last time these two sides met way back in 1998.

Back then, Newcastle had been flying high for a few seasons in the Premier League and had superstars such as Alan Shearer within their ranks. It took two matches and the intervention of Shearer for The Magpies to progress past a plucky non-league Stevenage outfit, although the lasting memory of the encounter will be the off-field arguments between the two clubs.

Most of the trouble centred around the Stevenage ground. Newcastle officials claimed that Broadhall Way, or The Lamex Stadium as it is currently known, was unsafe to hold the larger than normal crowd that was anticipated on the day, and this was before our officials even visted the ground. Much mud was thrown and Newcastle were made to look like the bullies after attempting to get the game switched to St James' Park.

Stevenage won out on that occasion and the game went ahead as planned with the addition of a temporary stand. The events around that day lacked class from all parties. Stevenage weren't innocent in the whole affair and their chairman at the time acted like a bit of a tosser, but we hardly covered ourselves in glory either. If you want to cast your minds back to that match you can do so by watching this video.

Fast forward 13 years and we find ourselves in the position of having the exact same fixture, although this time the build up to the game has been an all together quieter affair with matters centred around team news rather than horrer stories about the two clubs bickering.

Speaking of team news, Alan Pardew will have to make do and mend as he takes an injury plagued Newcastle side to Broadhall Way. The visitors will be without several first team players for the game, with several more likely to not be risked in preparation for the Wear-Tyne derby match next weekend.

Midweek hat-trick hero Leon Best is struggling with a heel injury whilst Steven Taylor and Cheik Tiote are both struggling with hamstring strains. All three of those injuries were picked in the 5-0 victory over West Ham.

Andy Carroll, Sol Campbell, Alan Smith, Ryan Taylor and Hatem Ben Arfa are all definately ruled out through injury whilst Steve Harper will miss the match on comapssionate grounds due to his wife being heavily pregnant. The one bit of good news is that Dan Gosling could feature at some point for Newcastle.

I expect that we will play a mixture of youth and fringe players, although any sudden recovery to any senior players could well see them involved aswell. For what it's worth I would go with a team looking something like this;

Newcastle: Tim Krul, James Perch, Mike Williamson, Tamas Kadar, Shane Ferguson, Wayne Routledge, Danny Guthrie, Kevin Nolan, Xisco, Nile Ranger, Peter Lovenkrands.

Stevenage will be missing Darius Charles for the match tomorrow as he serves the last game of a three match ban. Byron Harrison will be unavailable for The Boro as he is cup tied after already playing for Carshalton in an earlier round.

Joe Byrom, Darren Murphy and Lee Boylan will hope to be in contention after shaking off recent injuries, although manager Graham Westley could name an unchanged team from the one that beat Barnet on Monday.

Stevenage: Chris Day, Scott Laird, Luke Foster, Mark Roberts, Lawrie Wilson, Stacy Long, John Mousinho, Michael Bostwick, Charlie Griffin, Rob Sinclair, Chris Beardsley, Rob Sinclair.

The last time these two sides met in the cup it took two games to seperate them, as you may have seen if you watched the video earlier up in the article, but by the end of the cup run Newcastle found themselves in the final.

Hopefully the omens will be similar this time around.

Howay the lads!