Eddie Howe to stick to his guns - Our predicted XI as Newcastle United take on Manchester United on Sunday

Newcastle United take on Manchester United at St James' Park in a 4:30pm kick-off on Sunday, live on Sky Sports.

Newcastle are looking to do the league double over Man United for the first time since before colour was even invented. The Magpies can banish a 94-year-old streak with a win on Sunday.

Eddie Howe's boys are certainly the favourites going into this game, the form is with them and Man United are in the middle of a testing Europa League sandwich with a second leg tie against Lyon coming up.

Man United have hardly been a force this season and sit eight places below Newcastle in the league. The writing is on the wall, surely, and in order to achieve this victory, we expect Eddie Howe will stick to the team that has won the last three games.

Goalkeeper

Nick Pope - A nice little clean sheet on Monday for Eddie Howe's first-choice stopper should boost his confidence going into this one.

Defenders

Kieran Trippier - 34-year-old Trippier is like a player reborn lately, long may it continue.

Fabian Schar - The handsome swine is probably still dreaming about that 55-yard effort that hit the bar on Monday. We are.

Dan Burn - Still well on course for the Player of the Season gong.

Tino Livramento - Are we sure he's not really a left-back?

Midfielders

Bruno Guimaraes (c) - Comes up against the great pretender. There's only one Bruno.

Sandro Tonali - Hopefully all this hogwash about another betting scandal doesn't distract him.

Joelinton - Walking that suspension tightrope but we'd be amazed if it slows him down at all.

Forwards

Jacob Murphy - You know what, he could be pushing Dan Burn for Player of the Season, you know?

Alexander Isak - Hopefully he will show Manchester United what a world-class player looks like in 2025.

Harvey Barnes - It doesn't sound like Anthony Gordon will be fit, but even if he is, Barnes has earned his spot lately.

We said this against Leicester and were wrong, but we'll put it out there again, Anthony Gordon may make the bench for this one, but we don't expect him to start thanks to the form of Barnes.

Joe Willock will miss out due to concussion protocol, who knows what's going on with Matt Targett who was MIA once again on Monday.

The starting XI should be more than enough to deal with the threat of this Man United team.