Forest vs Newcastle preview, prediction, h2h: Awoniyi’s comeback story meets Howe’s survival test

Two Premier League clubs with vastly different problems converge at the City Ground on Sunday, May 10, 2026, when Nottingham Forest host Newcastle United in a fixture that carries genuine late-season weight despite neither club being anywhere near the top or bottom of the table.

Forest arrive carrying the bruises of a 4-0 Europa League semi-final demolition by Aston Villa on Thursday night, a defeat that ended the club’s first continental journey in 30 years in the most crushing fashion possible, and they now need to refocus their battered squad on securing Premier League survival with three games remaining.

Forest’s Extraordinary Season of Upheaval

The story of Nottingham Forest’s 2025-26 campaign is, by some distance, the most chaotic in the Premier League this season.

Four permanent managers in a single campaign is a Premier League record. Nuno Espírito Santo left in September amid disagreements with owner Evangelos Marinakis over transfers, Ange Postecoglou arrived and went winless in eight games before his exit, Sean Dyche then took 10 wins from 25 before a goalless draw at home to Wolves proved one error too many, and Vítor Pereira arrived on February 15 to become the fourth.

That the club has survived at all, let alone reached the semi-finals of the Europa League, is remarkable under the circumstances.

Pereira, who steadied Wolves from the relegation zone in 2024-25 before being sacked in November, has done precisely what he was hired to do, winning five consecutive matches across all competitions heading into Sunday’s game, including a stunning 3-1 victory at Stamford Bridge against Chelsea.

Forest’s home record remains a concern: four wins, six draws and seven defeats at the City Ground this season, which partly explains why they are still not mathematically safe despite accumulating 42 points from 35 games.

The Europa League adventure, which represented the club’s first continental football since 1995-96, ended with a 4-1 aggregate defeat to Aston Villa, with Villa winning 4-0 at Villa Park in the second leg to produce what became the biggest-ever victory by an English club against an English opponent in European competition.

Pereira now needs his players to channel Thursday’s pain into Sunday’s purpose: a win against Newcastle would confirm their Premier League status for another season.

Newcastle’s Slide and Howe’s Uncertain Future

Few clubs have underperformed their resources more visibly in 2025-26 than Newcastle, who entered the season as Champions League participants and close to £1bn invested, yet head to the City Ground needing a single point to avoid even the threat of an unlikely relegation.

Their four losses from the last five Premier League away games, including defeats at Crystal Palace, Arsenal and Barcelona in the Champions League, reflect a team that has repeatedly failed to perform on the road despite being technically superior to most opponents they face.

The 3-1 win at home to Brighton last Saturday ended a four-match winless Premier League run and briefly restored some confidence, but Howe knows that one win does not reset the concerns of a fanbase and ownership that expected a top-six challenge, not a late-season scramble for safety.

The PIF summit, in which Howe was reportedly asked “challenging questions” about the team’s decline, ended with him keeping his job, yet the pressure to deliver something tangible in the final three games of the campaign remains significant.

There is, though, one statistic that will offer genuine comfort to Howe and his squad ahead of Sunday: Newcastle have avoided defeat in every one of their last seven Premier League away games at the City Ground, winning four of them consecutively.

Head-to-Head Record: Newcastle’s Tyneside Advantage

The reverse fixture at St James’ Park on October 5, 2025 went to Newcastle, with Bruno Guimarães opening the scoring in the 58th minute before Nick Woltemade converted an 84th-minute penalty to give Howe’s side a 2-0 win.

That result came during Forest’s worst stretch of the season, under Ange Postecoglou’s short tenure, and sent Forest to their sixth straight defeat at the time.

The previous meeting at the City Ground, in November 2024, also ended in a Newcastle win, with the Magpies winning 3-1 on Trentside, and the overall picture from the last 15 Premier League meetings between these two sides shows Newcastle winning nine times to Forest’s five, with just one draw.

Indeed, the only time Newcastle have failed to win in their last four City Ground visits before Sunday was a draw earlier in the Premier League era, and Howe’s side have scored three or more goals on multiple occasions on these trips.

The historical weight of this head-to-head record will not be lost on either camp heading into Sunday’s contest.

Team News: Forest Stretched After European Exertions

Forest’s injury situation has worsened at the worst possible time, with Ibrahim Sangaré and Zach Abbott confirmed as absent. OUT

Murillo, Ola Aina, the Super Eagles defender, and Dan Ndoye are all considered doubts, with late fitness assessments likely to determine their availability after a demanding run of fixtures. DOUBT

The biggest selection dilemma for Pereira centres on Morgan Gibbs-White, who missed Thursday’s Europa semi-final with a nasty cut sustained in the Chelsea win.

With the England international’s 13 Premier League goals and four assists making him Forest’s most important creative force, Pereira will be desperate to have him available, though the manager admitted at his press conference that Gibbs-White’s status remains uncertain.

Taiwo Awoniyi, the Super Eagles striker whose return from a near-fatal abdominal injury has been one of the most uplifting stories of the Premier League season, is expected to start and brings with him the momentum of scoring twice at Stamford Bridge in the Chelsea win.

Ryan Yates is a candidate to bring energy into the midfield alongside Nicolás Domínguez, while Anthony Elanga and Callum Hudson-Odoi are expected to provide width in Pereira’s front three.

Forest Predicted XI (3-4-3)

Sels; Milenkovic, Williams, Moreno; Elanga, Yates, Dominguez, Hudson-Odoi; Gibbs-White (if fit), Awoniyi, Ndoye

Newcastle manager Howe confirmed no fresh injury concerns at his press conference, though Lewis Miley’s season is over after the young midfielder suffered a fibula fracture in training. OUT

Tino Livramento remains sidelined with a groin injury and Emil Krafth continues his long-term recovery from a knee problem, while Fabian Schär is rated as a 50-50 doubt heading into Sunday. OUT DOUBT

Of Miley, Howe said: “It was a really innocuous moment in training on Tuesday, no other player involved. Surgery went well, he faces a few months out and we hope he will be back around pre-season. It is a shame as he had been outstanding in recent weeks.”

Kieran Trippier is set to return at right back, having been replaced by Miley in recent weeks, and Malick Thiaw, Sven Botman and Dan Burn are expected to complete the defensive four.

Bruno Guimarães and Sandro Tonali continue as the midfield axis, with Joe Willock, Jacob Murphy and Joelinton providing support to the attacking positions. William Osula is expected to lead the line with support from those midfield runners.

Newcastle Predicted XI (4-3-3)

Pope; Trippier, Thiaw, Botman, Burn; Guimaraes, Tonali, Willock; Murphy, Osula, Joelinton

Star Player Comparison: Gibbs-White vs Guimaraes

Awoniyi’s Miraculous Return: The Super Eagles Striker Defying the Odds

For Nigerian football supporters, Sunday’s match carries a deeply personal narrative in the form of Taiwo Awoniyi, the Super Eagles striker who spent part of last season fighting for his life.

In May 2025, Awoniyi collided with a goalpost during Forest’s 2-2 draw with Leicester City, suffering a ruptured intestine in a traumatic incident that saw him attempt to play on before being rushed into emergency surgery and subsequently placed in an induced coma.

His recovery was long and frightening, but the 28-year-old returned to action in October 2025, and on January 25, 2026, he scored his first Premier League goal since the injury, netting in a 2-0 win over Brentford to an emotional reception from the Forest faithful.

Since then, Awoniyi has grown in confidence and form, and his brace at Stamford Bridge in Forest’s 3-1 win over Chelsea — one of the most prestigious grounds in English football — stands as evidence that his ability has not been diminished by what he endured.

The striker has spoken publicly about his gratitude: “This season has been one of the most difficult of my career but through it all I have felt the love. With the grace of God, I am grateful to still be here.”

He now stands on the verge of helping Forest secure top-flight survival, which would represent one of the Premier League’s most emotionally charged moments of the entire campaign.

Newcastle’s backline, which has conceded in all five of their last five away games, will need to be at their most disciplined to contain a striker running hot at the most important stage of the season.

The Managers: Pereira’s Rescue Act and Howe’s Reckoning

Vítor Pereira has lived this exact situation before.

The 57-year-old Portuguese coach arrived at Molineux in December 2024 with Wolves in the relegation zone and promptly orchestrated a six-game winning run that saved the club, establishing what was at the time the longest unbeaten run by any Premier League side that season.

He was sacked by Wolves in November 2025 despite that achievement, and was out of work for just 10 weeks before Marinakis offered him an 18-month deal to repeat the act at the City Ground.

His record at Forest has been built on defensive solidity and direct transitions, with Awoniyi’s physicality at the tip of the attack now central to his approach, and he has demonstrably lifted both the performance level and the mood at a club that had grown weary of change.

Eddie Howe, for his part, is a very different kind of manager facing a very different kind of pressure.

The 48-year-old has been associated with the Newcastle project since 2021 and has presided over the club’s most sustained top-flight run in decades, including a third-place Premier League finish in 2022-23, yet this season’s regression has exposed the limits of what he has built.

His post-Brighton comments suggested a manager trying to keep perspective: the win was welcomed but he was careful not to oversell it as evidence that the problems had been fixed.

How Howe handles Sunday’s trip to a hostile City Ground — historically his side’s most successful away venue in the Premier League, paradoxically — will reveal a great deal about the mood and confidence of his squad heading into the close season.

Tactical Preview: Can Forest’s Energy Overcome Newcastle’s Historical Comfort?

Pereira has preferred a 3-4-3 or 3-5-2 shape since taking charge, using Forest’s wide midfielders as both defensive screens and attacking outlets, and building plays through the physical presence of Awoniyi with runners off the sides to create second-ball situations.

The challenge for Forest is that Thursday’s 4-0 Europa defeat will have taken a physical and mental toll: players who featured heavily in that match will be carrying fatigue into a game that demands maximum effort, particularly in the wide areas where Pereira asks his wing-backs or wingers to cover enormous amounts of ground.

Newcastle are expected to line up in a 4-3-3 with Guimarães operating with more freedom than his defensive midfield position might suggest, frequently arriving in attacking areas to add numbers in and around the box — a system that was effective against Brighton last Saturday when the Brazilian opened the scoring.

Forest’s three-man central defence should have the physical resources to contain Newcastle’s forward runners, particularly with Nikola Milenkovic commanding the back line, but the space behind the wing-backs when Forest press high is a potential weakness that Howe will have identified.

The key duel is likely to be between Guimarães and Forest’s central midfield pair.

If Yates and Domínguez can restrict his influence and limit the Brazilian’s ability to receive the ball in space and drive forward, Forest will be better placed to control the tempo.

At the other end, Gibbs-White — if passed fit — is Forest’s most dangerous creative operator, and Newcastle’s midfield will need to press him aggressively before he can find Awoniyi in behind the defensive line.

Nottingham Forest vs Newcastle Betting Tips and Predictions

Final Score Prediction