Premier League make Newcastle United & Manchester City official decision ahead of St James' Park meeting

Jarren Gillett will be the referee for the match assisted by Darren Cann and Akil Howson with Robert Jones as fourth official. Gillett’s last match refereeing Newcastle was the FA Cup penalty shootout win at Blackburn Rovers back in February.

The Australian also took charge of Newcastle’s FA Cup match at Fulham and Carabao Cup penalty shootout defeat at Chelsea. His last Newcastle league match as referee at St James’ Park just so happened to be against Manchester City in August 2022.

The sides played out a thrilling 3-3 draw with Gillett showing Kieran Trippier a straight red card in the match before it was overturned by VAR.

Speaking of VAR, Stuart Attwell will be monitoring the match from Stockley Park, assisted by Timothy Wood.

Manchester City go into the game sitting top of the Premier League table with 13 points out of a possible 15. Newcastle have taken 10 points from their opening five matches but were deservedly beaten at Fulham last weekend.

It was Newcastle’s first defeat of the new season with Eddie Howe still looking to get the best out of his squad. Howe has never beaten Man City as Newcastle manager in the Premier League with his only victory against Pep Guardiola’s side coming almost exactly a year ago in the Carabao Cup.

The last meeting between the sides in the Premier League saw Man City claim a last-gasp 3-2 victory at St James’ Park. Newcastle led the match 2-1 at half-time with goals from Alexander Isak and Anthony Gordon cancelling out Bernardo Silva’s opener.

Kevin De Bruyne came off the bench to equalise and set-up a stoppage-time winner scored by Oscar Bobb. De Bruyne is a major injury doubt for Saturday’s game with Bobb already ruled out with a broken leg.