Newcastle United stopped Erling Haaland (£14.9m) from scoring for the sixth league and cup match in a row on Saturday evening.
The Magpies again saved their best for Tyneside with a 2-1 win over Pep Guardiola’s side, who have won only two of their six away games this season.
Here’s what we learned from the clash at St James’ Park.
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HAALAND BLANKS – SOMEHOW
The brilliant Malick Thiaw (£4.9m) rightly earned plaudits for his handling of Haaland on Saturday. But if this was the Norwegian at his ‘quietest’, then an expected goals (xG) total of 1.54 just underscores what an unrelenting menace the striker is.
Yes, Thiaw and the recalled Fabian Schar (£5.3m) generally shackled Haaland well. But FPL’s runaway points leader should still have scored on two, possibly three occasions.
As early as the second minute, Haaland was clean through on goal and uncharacteristically screwed an attempted chip wide. Half an hour later, he fired straight at Nick Pope (£5.2m) from eight yards. Even with his lower-xG header in the 58th minute, you’ve seen him bury that back-post chance on multiple occasions.
He probably should have had a penalty, too, for a foul on Phil Foden (£8.0m) that wasn’t given.
So, those who went against Haaland as captain this week can toast their decisions – but given that he posted his third-highest xG of 2025/26, it shouldn’t have worked out quite so well.
Above: The Gameweeks in which Erling Haaland has posted his highest xG figures this season
DONNARUMMA IMPRESSES
In what was a thoroughly entertaining and nutty game, the big chances arrived at a fierce pace – in the first half especially.
As well as Haaland’s flurry of opportunities, Foden and Harvey Barnes (£6.3m) both somehow screwed wide with the goal at their mercy.
Rayan Cherki (£6.4m), Jeremy Doku (£6.5m) and Nico O’Reilly (£5.0m), who have each courted some FPL interest in recent weeks, were all denied assists thanks to the Foden and Haaland sitters. Doku, incidentally, is now second in the Premier League’s chance creation (CC, below) table:
But the City boys had Gianluigi Donnarumma (£5.7m) to thank for keeping them in the game at the other end. The Italian almost gifted Newcastle a goal early on – distribution is not his strong suit – but he made amends with three fine stops from a lively Nick Woltemade (£7.4m).
Donnarumma’s save percentage is now at a league-second-best 78.3% since his summer move.
A set-and-forget, rotation-proof (in theory!) ‘keeper for the following run ahead?
Those with money sloshing around may consider it but six points has very much been his ceiling this season.
BRACES FOR BARNES + BRUNO
Barnes made it three goals in two Gameweeks with a brace on Saturday.
His goals-per-game ratio has always been strong; it’s just the game-time guarantees that have been lacking. Anthony Gordon‘s (£7.3m) imminent return doesn’t help in that regard, even if Barnes holds the cards at present. Form or no form, you’d imagine that rotation on the flanks will ramp up in December.
As for Bruno Guimaraes (£6.6m), he claimed assists for both of Barnes’ strikes. Very quietly, he’s now risen to joint-fifth in the FPL midfielders’ points table:
One thing worth noting here, however, is that Eddie Howe switched the roles of Bruno and Sandro Tonali (£5.4m) on Saturday. The former, now in the ‘six’ role, made fewer final-third passes than he’d registered in any match this season.
It remains to be seen if Howe sticks with this tactic but it’s worth considering for those tempted by Bruno.
“That was one of the things we tweaked, without getting into too much detail, just to get the appropriate player in the position that we wanted them in. I thought both players played very, very well.” – Eddie Howe on the midfield switcheroo
HALL EXCELS – BAD NEWS FOR BURN?
It’s probably no coincidence that Newcastle’s display, particularly going forward, was better with Tino Livramento (£4.9m) and Lewis Hall (£5.2m) in the side. Both full-backs, Hall especially, were excellent on the night.
“That was a great performance from [Hall]. Took the ball under pressure, linked really well with Harvey, ran forward when he was able to in that first half, before his legs started to tire!
“Tino… physically looked unbelievable today, considering it was seven weeks out. A really high-level performance against a dangerous opponent.” – Eddie Howe
It begs the question of how Dan Burn (£5.1m) gets back in the side, with his one-match ban now over.
You could see Burn starting the midweek Champions League match against Marseille at left-back, with Hall cramping in the closing stages on Saturday. Thereafter, does Hall come back in for Gameweek 13? Perhaps Burn’s best chance of a recall is at left-sided centre-half, where Schar (on his wrong side) displaced the out-of-form Sven Botman (£4.9m) against City.
TRIPPIER + GORDON LATEST
Livramento was in the side because Kieran Trippier (£5.0m) was unexpectedly absent with a minor hamstring issue.
Howe provided the latest on him and Gordon after full-time.
“Anthony is very close, just not quite ready for today. But he’s working hard and he’ll be ready, I think, in the next few days.
“Kieran, I’m unsure, I’m waiting for feedback from the medical team.” – Eddie Howe
