Newcastle United unleash 'experienced' 33-goal attacking duo ahead of Man Utd & Brighton

Newcastle United continued their fine run of form in front of goal with a 4-1 win at Burnley on Saturday afternoon.

Callum Wilson, Sean Longstaff, Bruno Guimaraes and Alexander Isak scored for The Magpies. For the first time this season, Eddie Howe started both Wilson and Isak in attack.

It was Wilson’s first start since February while Isak went into the game in a rich vein of form having scored 12 goals in his last 13 league matches. Wilson opened the scoring with his ninth goal of the season against the run of play.

Isak missed his first penalty for the club in the second half before scoring a minute later to take his tally to 24 for the season in all competitions.

Reflecting on the decision to start both Isak and Wilson at Turf Moor, head coach Eddie Howe said: “We asked Jacob [Murphy] to do a couple of different things today and the whole team was set-up slightly differently which we felt we needed to play against Burnley - we felt this was the right way.

“With our away form the way it has been, we felt this was an opportunity to play two experienced strikers and try and give the opposition problems with that.

“It's all very well me having that idea but the players have got to deliver it and I have to say our delivery and execution was excellent. We gave them problems with the attacking players we had on the pitch, sometimes it doesn't work out like that but I think today it did and delighted to score four goals.”

There was a moment of deliberation in the second half as Wilson initially grabbed the ball to take the penalty won by Anthony Gordon before Isak stepped up and saw his effort saved by Arijanet Muric.  The Swede had scored eight out of eight penalties for Newcastle before that spot kick while Wilson boasts a perfect penalty record having scored 11 out of 11 from 12 yards.

“Callum wanted to take it, naturally, he's very hungry for goals,” he told The Gazette. “But Alex has been our penalty taker and taken them very well until today. Callum was very gracious and stepped aside to let Alex take it.” 

Newcastle’s win saw them climb above Manchester United and up to sixth in the Premier League table with The Red Devils facing Crystal Palace on Monday evening. After that, there’s just three games remaining in the season with Newcastle facing Brighton & Hove Albion next up at St James’ Park before travelling to Old Trafford in what could prove to be a crucial game in the battle for European qualification.