United’s League Cup adventure continues tonight with a trip to former bogey team Newport County.
After a solid 1-0 win at Birmingham City we travel to Wales with the prize of a home tie against the winner of Oxford vs Watford awaiting the winner.
We’d expect Bonner to line up similarly to how we started against Carlisle on Saturday, with the exception of the injured O’Neil for May, and maybe a start for Harvey Knibbs up front. This season the League Cup doesn’t hand out prize money until the semi-finals, and with the prospect of limited capacity at the Abbey for the foreseeable meaning the chance for a sell-out crowd against a big team is off the table we don’t expect too many teams to be taking the early stages of the League Cup that seriously.
That said, we’re on a good run at the moment (3 games, six goals, none conceded) so it would be good to keep the momentum and morale up amongst the squad with another win.
As mentioned, Newport had proved something of a bogey team for us, with five defeats in a row until we drew 0-0 at the Abbey last August and got a much needed 1-0 win at Rodney Parade in February.
Former U’s now appearing in the amber and black of Newport (their shirt is almost identical to our kit from last season) include defenders Kyle Howkins and Mickey Demetriou as well as former scholar Robbie Willmot who made over 120 appearances over two spells at the Abbey between 2007-2011 and 2012-2013. One face who won’t be making an appearance is Ade Azeez, released by the club this week.
Newport have had a middling start to the season, drawing at Scunthorpe on Saturday in the League, beating Swansea in the last round of the League Cup, and losing to Cheltenham in the EFL Trophy.
Under The Abbey Stand 
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