Toon trio treading tightrope today - Three Newcastle players are one booking away from suspension

It's Boxing Day, it's match day and Nottingham Forest are in town for a 12:30 kick-off in the Premier League.

Newcastle United will be desperate to put the nightmare of Luton behind them and get back to winning ways, which you'd expect them to do being at home. However, Newcastle have the worst record on Boxing Day of any other side in the top flight. Thinking back on that though, for the longest time we always had away fixtures on Boxing Day, so it's little surprise.

Nottingham Forest will be hoping for the new manager bounce after appointing Nuno Espirito Santo following the sacking of Steve Cooper.

Newcastle have three players on the verge of suspension

In our lineup prediction it looks like Eddie Howe has a decent squad to pick from. While nowhere near full-strength, it looks decent on paper. However, so many of the players available have been run into the ground lately an fatigue will still be an issue.

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We are expecting Joelinton to return to the squad today and he is one of three players who will have to watch himself as he's one booking away from an automatic suspension.

The other two are Sean Longstaff and Jamaal Lascelles.

Jamaal Lascelles could miss today's game and be safe from suspension

Sean Longstaff is likely to start we reckon, but Lascelles, having picked up an injury against Luton will likely not feature, or at best be on the bench.

Should the trio get through the game without picking up another caution, it would be mission complete as the counter resets in the New Year meaning they all start with a blank slate in January.

Joelinton is probably the biggest risk here, his style of play leaves him open to bookings, and if he's not quite 100% then errors are more likely.