Monday Football Tips: Back goals and cards at St James'

For all the talk of this being the busiest time of the season in football, both Newcastle and Manchester United have had plenty of rest ahead of their Festive clash at St James' Park on Monday Night Football.

The Magpies have had just over a week since their last game while, due to Covid, Man Utd have not played since 11 December so those that have not struggled with the illness should be fresh and firing.

Ralf Rangnick has not exactly transformed United yet - he has got three wins and a draw but they've scored just one goal in each of their last three, and a 1-0 win at Norwich thanks to a Ronaldo penalty and De Gea Man of the Match display was a performance right out of the Ole Gunnar Solskjaer playbook.

This should be a nice game for Rangnick to get an impressive display out of his men though, with Newcastle conceding 11 across three defeats in a row and a league-worst 41 overall this season.

Man Utd have scored more goals against Newcastle (112) than any team has against a single opponent in Premier League history, and while the Magpies have let in a joint-record 71 Premier League goals in 2021, they have scored in nine of their last 11 home league games.

With 12 of their last 18 league games resulting in both teams scoring, the promise of goals is one worth leaning on for betting purposes.

So, with Man Utd keeping just one clean sheet in the last 10 meetings with Newcastle, we'll take both teams to score but we'll add in some booking for our stats Bet Builder.

And even being rather conservative, seeing both teams shown two cards looks pretty achievable and pumps up our odds to around the 3/1 mark on the Sportsbook.

Newcastle have had 43 yellows this season, coming in at 2.39 per game which is second in the league, while Man Utd have seen 35 yellows from two less games at 2.19 a match to rank fifth.

With high stakes and a decent crowd in then both sides will be putting it about a bit and backing these stats should see us return a nice profit.