If/when Newcastle United lose on Saturday to Celtic – Please bear this in mind | OneFootball

Saturday sees Newcastle United face Celtic in the first pre-season friendly ahead of the 2025/26 Premier League season.

Last Saturday (12 July) there was a friendly against Carlisle United.

However, that was a behind closed doors kick about against the now non-league club, basically not much more than a training session as 22 members of the Newcastle United first team squad and Under 21s we divided into two separate elevens. One set of 11 players playing 45 minutes in the kick about, then the other 11 in the second 45.

Newcastle won that friendly ‘match’ 4-0 but it is tomorrow when things get (vaguely/relatively) serious.

Actually most of United’s key players, biggest assets, hadn’t even returned to the training ground by the time the Carlisle kick about happened. International players such as Gordon, Tonali, Livramento, Burn, Bruno and Isak, not back yet, whilst those who took part against Carlisle had only had a few days of group training.

Most of those international players did join the rest of the squad for this week’s training camp in Austria, although it looks like Tino given a little extra time due to his late June involvement with the England Under 21s.

So that is the state of play for the Newcastle United squad as with now 29 days to go until the new season kicks off, they now face the first of six pre-season friendlies.

Newcastle United pre-season friendly schedule 2025/26

(Saturday 12 July – Newcastle 4 Carlisle 0 (Behind closed doors))

Saturday 19 July – Celtic v Newcastle United

Sunday 27 July – Arsenal v Newcastle

Wednesday 30 July – Team K-League all stars v Newcastle

Sunday 3 August- Spurs v Newcastle

Friday 8 August – Newcastle v Espanyol

Saturday 9 August – Newcastle v Atletico Madrid

First game of new league season

Saturday 16 August – Aston Villa v Newcastle

Compare that then to tomorrow’s opponents and how their pre-season is shaping up…

Celtic pre-season friendly schedule 2025/26

Friday 4 July – Queen’s Park 0 Celtic 1

Tuesday 8 July – Cork City 1 Celtic 2

Saturday 12 July – Estrela da Amadora 3 Celtic 2

Wednesday 16 July – Sporting Lisbon 0 Celtic 2

Saturday 19 July – Celtic v Newcastle United

Thursday 24 July – Ajax v Celtic

Saturday 26 July or Sunday 27 July – Celtic v Al-Ahli or Como

First game of new league season

Sunday 3 August – Celtic v St Mirren

As you can see, Celtic are effectively at least two weeks ahead of Newcastle United when it comes to pre-season preparations, including having played four friendlies already.

I think it is an attraction for Eddie Howe and his staff to play this kind of match against a Scottish club, a tougher test than normal for the Newcastle players when playing a team north of the border, as their season kicks off weeks earlier than the English Premier League.

The standard may not be that high in the Scottish top tier but the fact they have already had a number of friendlies and plenty of time on the training pitch, with their season only two weeks away, means that the likes of Celtic will push the Newcastle players a lot more at this stage of their preparations.

Indeed, exactly a year ago today, Eddie Howe and his squad travelled to Glasgow and won 2-1 in front of 51,000 against Rangers, Miguel Almiron and Harrison Ashby getting the goals.

I think pre-season friendlies are the very most extreme, when it comes to how Eddie Howe and the Newcastle United fans react to the actual result.

Whilst Eddie Howe and his staff will be overwhelmingly interested in how the fitness of the players was, how certain parts of the game played out, how well things they’d worked on now looked in a friendly.

Compared to us as fans, where all of us, to lesser or greater degrees, put far too much emphasis on the actual result.

In any match it is human nature to want to see Newcastle United come out on top, however, if/when Celtic win tomorrow, don’t go daft.

Man for man, the Celtic players will be far further along the way to full match fitness than the Newcastle United players will be. Plus, many of Newcastle’s very best players may well not be risked at all.

To the 10,000+ official travelling Newcastle United fans and those others in the home sections tomorrow, have a great time. However, along with the rest of us who won’t be in Glasgow this weekend, don’t take the result too seriously (unless we win!).