Eddie Howe has warned that Newcastle United and Arsenal have both moved on as team significantly since their last meeting back in May.
That night Newcastle triumphed 2-0 and prevented Arsenal making it to the Champions League with a furious debrief for the visitors then featuring in the All or Nothing documentary. Mikel Arteta has been known to use such low points as motivation in his team talks and did so last season with tweets from Ivan Toney used in his pre-match meeting.
Yet Howe would not be drawn into any invitations to play mind games or use the win over Arsenal six months ago as a badge of honour. The 2-0 win over Arteta's man was a Youtube hit and has had over 1.1million views since May but Howe knows it means nothing now.
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Howe said: "It's funny I don't look back on that or think about that game - it's gone. It was the end highlight of the season.
"We worked incredibly hard to stay up and that was a glimpse of what we could be in the future. Now we are only focused on this season and that game has zero relevance to this game.
"They are two totally new teams really. I'd say we've improved from that moment and Arsenal have gone on to another level. I'm sure both teams are looking at it as a new game."
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