Newcastle manager Eddie Howe has admitted that he would have preferred to have avoided Manchester United in the next round of the Carabao Cup.
Manchester United breezed past Crystal Palace with a 3-0 win at Old Trafford on Tuesday night. Then 24 hours later, Newcastle pulled off a shock result by beating Man City and they will travel to Old Trafford for a fourth round of the competition towards the end of the month.
Goals from Alejandro Garnacho, Casemiro and Anthony Martial sealed the win for United and booked our place in the next round.
It was former Real Sociedad striker Alexander Isak who scored the only goal Newcastle needed to eliminate Pep Guardiola’s City.
However, this means the fourth round is producing a repeat of last season’s final, with the game likely to be played on November 1.
Reflecting on the draw against United, Howe told NUFC TV (via Manchester Evening News): “It’s another top team but we’ve proved tonight that we’ve made changes to the group and we’ve won a very difficult game so I’m sure United will be equally as difficult but we’ll try and win. It’s the only way that we can view it [to win]. We’ll get to that game when we get to it, we don’t know where we’ll be in terms of our team, players and the selection of players we’ll have available. The way we’re going and the competitions we’re in, we’re playing elite teams all the time and we have to get used to it. It’s the only way we improve ourselves. It’s not maybe the draw we wanted but we respect United and how they do things but we’ll have to face it.”
Erik ten Hag will be looking at the remaining teams in the Carabao Cup and think we stand a very good chance to retain the trophy this season – once we get over the next hurdle.
United will be expected to beat Newcastle at Old Trafford, too. Especially with important players returning from injury.
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