Premier League · England · Regular Season - 27

Manchester City–Newcastle

2–1

HT 2–1

Kick-off: Saturday, 21 February 2026 at 20:00
Status: Match Finished
Venue: Etihad Stadium, Manchester

What the model said, and what happened

Prediction correct

This verdict goes into the public record unchanged; we do not filter out the ones we get wrong. The model's track record

Goals and red cards

14'Manchester CityN. O'Reilly (assist: Omar Marmoush)
22'NewcastleL. Hall (assist: J. Ramsey)
27'Manchester CityN. O'Reilly (assist: E. Haaland)

Match statistics

Match statistics
Manchester City		Newcastle
15	Shots	13
7	Shots on target	7
10	Shots inside the box	8
6	Goalkeeper saves	5
5	Corners	5
1	Offsides	5
55%	Possession	45%
460	Passes	362
388	Accurate passes

What we expected, and what happened

Expected goals before kick-off: Manchester City 1.85 · Newcastle 1.13. On the pitch: 2-1.
Shots Manchester City 15 · Newcastle 13; on target 7 and 7.
Manchester City kept the ball more (55%).

Referee

T. Bramall→

3.82

yellows per match

0.15

reds per match

matches of data

Model prediction

Why this prediction?

The model puts the most likely outcome at 62.4%: “Manchester City to win”. Second comes “a draw” at 20.8%.
Behind that distribution are the expected goals: 2.24 for Manchester City, 1.14 for Newcastle.
The highest double chance value is 83.2% (1X — Manchester City win or draw).
These values were computed from 1,405 past matches.

This is a prediction, not a guarantee; a probability is not a certainty.

These sentences are built by a fixed template; every number in them comes straight from the model's computation, none invented while the text was written.

Manchester City to win62.4%

Draw20.8%

Newcastle to win16.8%

When the model has said 60–65% in the past, 847 of 1,354 predictions were correct (62.6%). Accuracy record →

12	Fouls	13

2	Yellow cards	5

0	Red cards	0

First half

Actual: 2–1

Manchester City lead at half-time55.2%

Level at half-time35.3%

Newcastle lead at half-time9.4%

First-half double chance

1X — Manchester City ahead or level90.6%

12 — not level at half-time64.7%

X2 — level or Newcastle ahead44.8%

These values are not a fraction of the full-match prediction; they come from a separate model trained on the first-half scores of 1405 matches. Its edge over the base rate is markedly smaller than the full-match model's — the measured figure is on the accuracy record. Read them more cautiously. First-half goal markets are not published because they failed to beat the base rate.

Expected fouls and corners

Fouls

Manchester City: at least 9Actual: 12
Newcastle: at least 9Actual: 13

Corners

Manchester City: at least 5Actual: 5
Newcastle: at least 4Actual: 5

These figures are set to hold in at least 60% of matches; in the rest the count comes in below them. No upper bound is stated — we make no "at most" claim. Yellow cards were measured and are not published: there our model did not beat the historical average.

What these probabilities rest on

Expected goals comes out of a team's attack weighed against its opponent's defence. A strong attack is damped when it meets a strong defence — which is why comparing the ratings on their own is misleading.

How many goals Manchester City score1.85

Attack: Manchester City score above the league average (33% more).

Opponent's defence: Newcastle's defence is close to the league average (0.92×), so it doesn't move the expectation much.

Result: These two effects give an expectation of 1.85 goals (including home advantage).

How many goals Newcastle score1.13

Attack: Newcastle score above the league average (17% more).

Opponent's defence: Manchester City concede 22% fewer than the league average, which pulls the expectation down.

Result: These two effects give an expectation of 1.13 goals (including the away penalty).

Most likely scorelines

2–110.8%1–19.7%2–08.6%

A single scoreline is always less likely than an outcome: “home win” is the sum of 1-0, 2-0, 2-1 and dozens more. So the most likely single score can be a draw while the most likely outcome is a home win; the two do not contradict each other.