Newcastle 6 Preston 0: Aleksandar Mitrovic scores double on rare start as Toon run riot at St James’
NEWCASTLE might well be heading to Wembley this season – and it won’t be for a play-off final.
The table-topping Toon look dead certs to claim one of the Championship’s two automatic promotion places.
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But they are now just two ties away from booking a visit to the National Stadium for the first time since it was rebuilt.
Last night’s sensational stroll past ten-man Preston was Newcastle’s sixth straight win in all competitions.
And the mood Rafa Benitez’s boys are in right now, they will fancy their chances against anyone in what will be just their second domestic cup quarter-final in ten seasons under owner Mike Ashley.
Newcastle’s recent attitude towards the knock-out competitions has been a disgrace, with club chiefs even once admitting on the record how they weren’t their “priority”.
But a true signal of how that damaging approach has changed under boss Benitez was last night’s incredible crowd of 49,902.
That figure was just 860 shy of Newcastle’s record League Cup attendance, which came in a semi-final against Tottenham 40 years ago.
And the Toon Army were treated to their joint best win in this competition, with their cult hero, the mad cap Aleksandar Mitrovic, weighing in with a much-enjoyed brace.
Make no mistake, these supporters are beginning to dream of an unlikely first Wembley final in 18 years – they were singing as much during the second half.
And there is a feel-good factor around these parts that is barely believable when you consider it was a year ago to the day they lost 3-0 at rivals Sunderland under Steve McClaren.
Benitez has built a squad so strong that he can make seven changes as he did last night, and his side still looked no weaker on paper or in practice.
The opener came on 19 minutes when Matt Ritchie hung up a dream free-kick to the far post, with Mitrovic staying onside and running free to comfortably head in.
And Preston’s already difficult task was made almost imposssible eight minutes later when Alan Browne was sent off for horribly smashing Jack Colback in the face with his left forearm in an aerial challenge.
The bloodied Colback was forced off, but on 38 minutes Mo Diame sweetly struck his first for the club from 25 yards, after Mitrovic’s throughball to Christian Atsu was cut out.
Moments later the Senegalese midfielder embarrassingly missed an open goal from 12 yards, when Mitrovic collected then squared Eoin Doyle’s inexplicable back-pass.
But it mattered little as the second-half was as one-sided as St James’ will have seen for some time.
When Matt Ritchie was tripped in the box by Bailey Wright on 53 minutes, he lashed home the penalty himself – despite Mitrovic’s immature efforts to take the ball off his team-mate.
Mitro, though, would get his second just a couple of minutes later when he took down Hayden’s cross, knocked past two sliding defenders and the keeper, and blasted into the empty net.
He missed two headers for a chance for his first Newcastle hat-trick, while Atsu hit the post with a lob and then nodded against the bar.
But Diame added a fifth three minutes before the final whistle, picking up the ball from the halfway line, racing through untroubled, and bending in from 30 yards.
And Ayoze Perez completed the rout from just inside the box in injury time – leaving the jubilant Geordies singing long into the night.