Source: Northern_Echo
St James’ Park ready for Easter festival
IT has gone on for 316 days, but there is every chance it will not last any longer. At times embarrassing, at others emboldening, Newcastle United's exile from the Premier League is almost at an end.[LNB] If Chris Hughton's side claim a point from this evening's Championship home game with Sheffield United they will have secured their return to the promised land at the first time of asking.[LNB] It might not even come to that, as Newcastle's promotion will be confirmed before the turnstiles even open at St James' Park if third-placed Nottingham Forest fail to beat Cardiff City in an afternoon kick-off at the City Ground.[LNB] The road has been long and arduous, encompassing defeat at Derby, a battering of Barnsley and, most recently, a promotion party that wasn't at Peterborough.[LNB] But a club that was on its knees as recently as last May is poised to reclaim a place at football's top table, and even its most ardent critics would struggle to claim it is undeserved.[LNB] It might not be redemption given the low base from which the Magpies will be starting next season, but it is undoubtedly recovery.[LNB] And it will be hard to find too many supporters in this evening's Championshiprecord crowd who are dissatisfied with that.[LNB] We're nearly there, said Hughton, who deserves considerable praise for the levelheaded manner in which he has navigated a gruelling Championship campaign. It would have been nice to get things done at the weekend, but there's a fair chunk of us that says it will be nice to finish it off at home because the fans have deserved it.[LNB] Would we have taken this position at the start of the season[LNB] Definitely. Did we think we would be here at this stage Probably not.[LNB] But we knew we would be up there fighting, and we've put ourselves in a wonderful position now.[LNB] That position sees Newcastle having established a new club record for the number of clean sheets recorded in a season, and still on course to go through a whole league season unbeaten at home for the first time in 103 years.[LNB] Today, there will be plenty of commentators reflecting that promotion should be regarded as an inevitability given the size of Newcastle's wage bill, and the presence of players such as Fabricio Coloccini, Jose Enrique, Jonas Gutierrez, Kevin Nolan and Shola Ameobi, Premier League performers who have remained to ply their trade at a lower level.[LNB] But the Football League is littered with clubs who failed to live up to their billing as promotion favourites and spent years, even decades, in the lower leagues as a result.[LNB] It is only nine months since Newcastle were conceding six goals in a pre-season friendly at Leyton Orient and bookmakers were rushing to offer prices on the club spending next season in League One rather than the Premier League.[LNB] What has happened since has been little short of staggering, and the extent of the Magpies' achievements should not be diluted by the benefit of hindsight.[LNB] If we're able to do it, the overriding feeling would be one of immense pride, said Hughton.[LNB] Everybody at the club feels Newcastle belongs in the Premier League.[LNB] We have no God given right to be there, and at the moment, we don't deserve to be there because we were relegated last season.[LNB] But we feel it's a wonderful achievement to go back up first time.[LNB] Everyone is aware that, if you don't do it first time, that second season can become very difficult.[LNB] So to do it first time is wonderful and will give all of us a lot of satisfaction.[LNB] Hughton is expected to make changes this evening, having rested a number of senior players during Saturday's 3-2 win at Peterborough, a result that couldn't quite confirm Newcastle's promotion when Nottingham Forest drew at Bristol City.[LNB] Gutierrez, Andy Carroll, Peter Lovenkrands, Danny Guthrie and Wayne Routledge are all expected to return to the starting line-up, as Hughton reverts to the side that has served him so well for the majority of the second half of the season.[LNB] The campaign will not end tonight, as the Magpies still have five more games to play and the Championship title continues to hang in the balance following West Bromwich Albion's Fridaynight win over Leicester.[LNB] But to all intents and purposes, this is where the journey towards salvation becomes complete.[LNB] One more point to signal the start of a new era.[LNB] NEWCASTLE (probable, 4-4-2): Harper; Simpson, Coloccini, Williamson, Enrique; Routledge, Guthrie, Nolan, Gutierrez; Carroll, Lovenkrands.[LNB]
