Newcastle United heading for third place in Premier League in 17 days time – Three results needed

The top end of the Premier League looks ever more intriguing.

So little consistency amongst so many teams, as we move towards the business end of things.

Whilst Arsenal and Manchester City battle it out at the very top end, it is of course the race for top four that Newcastle United fans are focused on.

The volatile nature of this race for Champions League places is such, that many people were wanting to write NUFC off as no-hopers for Premier League top four, purely due to their second and third defeats of this PL season that arrived in the 23rd and 24th matches, against Liverpool and Man City.

Yet one win, the one on Sunday against Wolves, along with almost all of the other results going for them, suddenly made any rational football fan accept that Newcastle United are clearly still very much in this top four race.

However, this transformation could set to turn out even more remarkable in double-quick time…

This is how the Premier League table looks on Thursday morning, things tightening up a little bit more after Brighton won at home against Palace and Brentford went to Southampton and came away with three points

As you can see, Brighton moving to within only two points of Newcastle with same number of games played, whilst Brentford are three points adrift of NUFC having played a game more.

So, these are the Premier League games that are now set to be played in these next 17 days that affect the race for top four, I have left out Man City and Arsenal, concentrating on the clubs placed 3rd (Man U) to 10th (Chelsea):

Friday 17 March

Nottingham Forest v Newcastle (8pm)

Saturday 18 March

Brentford v Leicester (3pm)

Southampton v Tottenham (3pm)

Chelsea v Everton (5.30pm)

Saturday 1 April

Man City v Liverpool (12.30pm)

Bournemouth v Fulham (3pm)

Brighton v Brentford (3pm)

Chelsea v Aston Villa (5.30pm)

Sunday 2 April

Newcastle United v Man U (4.30pm)

So…only three results needed and Newcastle United would be guaranteed to be third in the Premier League in 17 days time.

Eddie Howe’s team needing to win at Forest tomorrow night, then Spurs fail to win at Southampton on Saturday, before finally Newcastle United needing to emerge victorious in that massive game against (missing Casemiro) Man U on Sunday 2 April.

I am not saying that this will definitely happen BUT I am saying that it is more than possible.

Which just goes to prove how distorted the media can make things, having written off Newcastle United but only a very small number of results potentially putting them back into third.

So basically, if say Tottenham draw at Southampton and Newcastle win against Forest and Man U, the Premier League top three would look like this:

50 points Newcastle United

50 Points Man U

49 points Tottenham

After these fixtures, Tottenham will have only 10 PL games left to play, Newcastle United and Man U 11 each.

With these three results, Newcastle United would also be guaranteed to be at least sixteen goals better off on GD than Man U and at least nine goals better off than Tottenham.