A win against the Eagles would see Newcastle jump up to third position in the English top flight, just four points behind Arsenal, and leave their European destiny in their own hands with just six matches to play - including against the Gunners.
Recent history certainly favours the hosts, as Newcastle have kept a clean sheet in six of their last eight Premier League home games against Crystal Palace, including each of the last three in a row.
Furthermore, the South London outfit won just one of their last seven league games against Newcastle (D4 L2), beating them 2-0 at Selhurst Park in April last year.
Somewhat ominously, since December 14, 2024, Eddie Howe's side have won more games in all competitions than any other Premier League side (18 in 23 games).
Newcastle have won five out of their last six played on a Wednesday
Their 53 goals scored in that time are behind only Liverpool (61) and Manchester City (58), and they've lost just one of their last 12 midweek (Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday) home games in the Premier League (W8 D3) which came via a 3-1 defeat to Nottingham Forest on Boxing Day 2023.
Wednesday seems to be a particularly good day for the Magpies at present as they've won five of their last six matches at St. James’ Park in the league on that day of the week, drawing the other.
There is some hope for Oliver Glasner's side, however.
For a start, Palace have scored in each of their last 13 Premier League matches, and Eddie Howe has won just five of his 21 games against Crystal Palace in all competitions (D9 L7), a win rate of 24%.
Among all sides he has faced more than 10 times as a manager, only against Manchester City (5%), Liverpool (9%), and Watford (16%) does he have a poorer win ratio.
He won't be on the touchline for this one as he remains in hospital looking to recover from a bout of pneumonia, though he's more than likely to have still been passing on instructions to assistant Jason Tindall from his hospital bed. After all, this is very much Eddie Howe's Newcastle side.
Draw between Palace and Newcastle in November was significant
When the two sides met last November, the 1-1 draw at Selhurst Park was significant if nothing to really write home about.
In fact, in almost every aspect, both sides cancelled each other out.
Palace's eight corners was just one less than Newcastle's, both were caught offside twice and both sides picked up three yellow cards each.
11 fouls were made by the visitors, 12 for the hosts; an 80% pass accuracy from Newcastle just nudged ahead of Palace's 79%; possession was split 52% to 48%; and passes played by the hosts (402) were only slightly under the 418 of Howe's team.
The only metric to have shown a cavernous difference was in terms of shots.
The Eagles had 16, four of which were on target, whilst Newcastle had just one shot (off target) in the game with their goal coming via Palace's Marc Guehi, a player long linked with a move to Tyneside.
To put the 90 minutes into even more perspective, it was only the eighth instance on record (since 2003/04) of a side having one shot or fewer in a Premier League match and still not ending up losing the game.
Current form shows how evenly matched Newcastle and Palace are
The current form table also shows how evenly matched the teams are ahead of Wednesday's game too.
Palace have lost only three of their last 12 in all competitions, drawing one and winning eight of them, whilst Newcastle have lost four of the last 12 but won the other eight - and they haven't drawn a game since way back on December 4 last year against Liverpool (3-3), coincidentally coming just a few days after the 1-1 at Selhurst Park.
Where perhaps Newcastle will have the edge is that they have a number of attacking players who can turn the course of a game.
Harvey Barnes has come into the fray of late for example, and has been involved in nine goals in his last 11 Premier League starts (seven goals, two assists), including at least one in each of his last five (four goals, two assists) whilst Jacob Murphy has scored seven and assisted eight in his last 17 Premier League appearances.
The Magpies also have the likes of Alexander Isak, Sandro Tonali, Joelinton and Bruno Guimaraes all playing at the top of the game and still on a high after winning the Carabao Cup this season.
Palace will look to Eberechi Eze to provide the magic at St. James' Park
Whilst the South Londoners also have a decent squad, they generally look to England international Eberechi Eze to provide the magic and get things going in an attacking sense.
With a hand in eight goals in his last 11 Premier League starts for Crystal Palace (two goals, six assists) the squad's position is easy to understand, and Eze’s 89 shots this season are the most by a Palace player in a single campaign since Christian Benteke in 2016/17 (105).
Given that Eze and his Palace teammates don't really have anything to play for other than pride in their performance, that makes them a dangerous customer for a club that have proven beyond doubt this season that they belong back in the Champions League after a year's hiatus from European competition.
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