Right, I’m off to watch Arsenal play QPR. Follow it with me here. Bye!

90+3 mins: We’re now into the third of those four minutes, and Newcastle have their first touch of stoppage time. It’s a throw-in, inside their own half.

90+1 mins: We’re into the first of four additional minutes.

89 mins: Gouffran is booked for accidentally touching Mata’s ankle. Given that first-half penalty appeal, there’s a certain irony to the incident.

82 mins: Newcastle do another thing! This time they have a free-kick on the left wing which is whipped into the near post, where Taylor heads over. After which, Newcastle bring off the effervescent Perez, and bring on Vuckic.

80 mins: Valencia has come off, and Rafael has come on.

79 mins: Van Persie fluffs a sitter! Mata crosses from the right, and it eventually drops to Van Persie, on his right foot. He swings, and misses!

77 mins: I’m not sure Newcastle have touched the ball in the three minutes since my last update.

74 mins: It’s pretty quiet both on and off the pitch at Old Trafford. MUFC having plenty of possession, but don’t really need to do anything with it and thus aren’t.

70 mins: It’s bucketing down in Manchester, and has been for quite a while. Could be worse: there’s a blizzard at the Hawthorns.

66 mins: A comically bad challenge from Van Persie on Janmaat, sliding in at ankle-height when the ball is four feet off the ground, earns him a booking.

65 mins: United bring Wilson on, and take Falcao off.

64 mins: Young, playing as well as he has for a couple of seasons or so, wins a corner, but nothing much comes of it except for a raised offside flag.

62 mins: Rooney chips the ball over the wall, but it lands on the roof of the net. After which, Newcastle take off Dummet and Armstrong and bring on Cabella and Papiss Cissé.

62 mins: But before that, Darren Fletcher is coming on and Carrick is going off.

61 mins: Mata is brought down 20 yards from goal, which brings Taylor a booking and United a very fine shooting chance.

60 mins: MUFC work the ball across the edge of Newcastle’s penalty area, right to left, ending with Rooney’s left-foot cross-shot which lacks power and is saved.

58 mins: Colback hits another decent free-kick from the left, which is headed by Rooney to the edge of the area, where Armstrong lashes a shot across goal and just wide. Nice try.

57 mins: Talking of doing the same thing again and again, Young cuts onto his right foot and crosses from the left, and Falcao really should have scored except he, well, didn’t.

55 min: Falcao chips the ball over the Newcastle defence, and Van Persie might have volleyed it goalwards but decides against it at the last moment, and the chance is gone. But United are like a 12-year-old kid in 1990 who’s just discovered a way of scoring every time in Sensible Soccer and is just doing it again and again and again.

50 mins: A slow start to half two, though to be fair Newcastle did have a corner, which United successfully defended despite a comically poor attempted clearance from Falcao.

Before today, Rooney had never scored for his club on a Friday. Which leads to this vital stat of the day:

Meanwhile, the vital Manchester United-related news story of the day, courtesy of The Sun, who found a “United source” who told them this:

Some of our players — including first team regulars like Luke Shaw and Adnan Januzaj — are in their teens and some haven’t learned how to cook. So we send a chef to give their fridges the once-over. The chef explains what needs throwing out, what’s healthy and what’s not. Then they re-stock the fridge and work on some healthy recipes. Most have £30,000 designer kitchens which wouldn’t be out of place in Michelin-starred restaurants but some can barely use a microwave.

A very decent Manchester United performance, better than their opponents in almost all key areas. Ashley Young had given Janmaat a very hard time on his wing; Mata has, I think, been man-marked at all points except for when he set up both goals, which has got to hurt; Rooney’s running into the penalty area from deep positions has been very nicely timed. The goals were both excellent. All in all, a significant improvement on their recent performances.

45+1 mins: We’re into the first and indeed only minute of stoppage time.

43 mins: MUFC are now in fairly complete control here, with the visitors just hanging about waiting for half-time, when there’s a chance they might be the grateful recipients of some beneficial managerial fairy-dust.

39 mins: Valencia runs down the right, cuts inside, jibs back onto his right foot and then shoots at the goalkeeper.

36 mins: MUFC break again, with Valencia charging down the right, but his cross towards Van Persie doesn’t go close enough to Van Persie for Van Persie to do anything with it.

34 mins: A lovely free-kick from the left by Colback, which Jones does well to head into touch at the far post.

30 mins: Van Persie buys some space with a nice feint, and then pulls the ball back to the edge of the area, where both Rooney and Falcao lurk. It looked to me like Rooney should have got there first but instead he leaves it to the Colombian, who needs to take a touch before shooting, but instead takes two, and then doesn’t shoot, and loses possession.

27 mins: Another lovely inswinging left-wing right-foot cross from Young leads to havoc but no goal.

25 mins: Back in defence, McNair was ever so grumpy about not getting a free-kick following his tussle with Armstrong, but had the whistle blown Man Utd would never have scored that. Funny old game etc.

23 mins: Armstrong leaves McNair grounded on the left and cuts inside, but his shot is blocked.

22 mins: Young crosses, right-footed, from the left and Falcao’s flicked header flashes wide of the far post. Plenty of promising attacking being done by both sides. Newcastle will think they should have had a penalty, though.

19 mins: Save! Janmaat collects the ball just inside United’s half and hares forwards, with nobody really trying to close him down, before lashing a shot goalwards from 20 yards that’s tipped over the bar by De Gea.

16 mins: Chance for United! Rooney passes over the defence from deep, Van Persie reaches the ball but it bounces off his chest and away from goal. Even so, with Alnwick off his line, he tries to score. But doesn’t.

13 mins: A cross from the left just misses Falcao but was clearly deflected, as the referee gives a corner and nobody argues. But from it Newcastle break, and cross from the right, and Gouffran’s running clear, favourite to win it, when he’s tripped by Mata and falls over. It didn’t look deliberate, but it clearly upended an opponent in the penalty area when he would otherwise have had a clear goalscoring opportunity. The referee is unimpressed.

12 mins: An optimistic punt down the right touchline gives Armstrong another chance to outpace Evans, and he then crosses to an unmarked Perez, who misses the ball with an attempted overhead. Good chance, or at least a good chance to create a great chance.

11 mins: Falcao goes on a bit of a run down the left, but his cross from the byline isn’t great, and Coloccini heads clear.

8 mins: And then down the other end Perez slaloms through and past several United defenders before he’s finally dispossessed on the edge of their area. A nice run, one more shimmy and a good shot away from startling brilliance.

8 mins: Dummett clears Evans’ cross from the left, with Falcao lurking behind him.

5 mins: A first touch for Armstrong, who outpaces Evans but tries to cut inside and can’t keep the ball.

4 mins: Offside-anyway chance and save! Mata, I think, dinks the ball over the visiting defence and Rooney heads towards the far post. Alnwick tips wide, and the assistant is waving, but still.

2 mins: Newcastle are in an all-silver away kit. If it were slightly more metallic, and perhaps had tinselled collars and star-shaped headpiece, it would be nicely festive. As it is, it’s basically just grey.

The teams are in the tunnel. Boxing Day-flavoured action imminent.

Alan Pardew on Armstrong:

This is a player that I’m hoping has a fantastic career in the Premier League. He’s young, but he already has a very mature head on his shoulders. He won’t be fazed by this situation.

I’m not sure 5 Live’s studio webcam feature really works when they’re doing an outside broadcast. These pictures just in:

And here’s what fans in Old Trafford will be listening to today. A lot of festive classics, in short, with a few more obscure yet still Xmas-related offerings to lend it credibility.

Where oh where oh where oh where is this one, though?

According to MUTV, the reason Di María is nowhere to be seen today is a minor injury sustained in training.

Armstrong also started the Capital One Cup games against Crystal Palace and Manchester City, and has a handful of Premier League substitute appearances to his name.

Turns out Adam Armstrong is Newcastle’s youngest starter in the Premier League era. So there’s a thing.

The Manchester United team looks like this:

The Newcastle team looks like this:

And this is what The Guardian’s Daniel Taylor says about it:

Hello world!

Since losing at Manchester City in the first weekend of November Manchester United have won six matches and drawn one, which is impressive. I’ve only seen two of those games – the last two victories, against Southampton and Liverpool – and they were utterly abject in the first, and only marginally less dreadful in the second. Consensus seems to be that they pretty comfortably beat a terrible Hull side and probably deserved to take all three points against Stoke, but by all accounts they were emphatically outplayed at Arsenal. And so it is that the big question posed by United’s sprint into the top four is not, for me, are they ready to contend for the title once again, but is this the least impressive very impressive run in football history?

Whatever, Newcastle could teach them a few things about the illusory potential of a six-game winning streak. They had one of their own across October and November but have lost four out of six since, winning only against Chelsea, and have lost their last three games by an aggregate score of 9-2. And now they arrive at a ground where they have won just once in 30 visits over 42 long years (though that was on their most recent visit, last December).

Still, you can’t really read much into that. “We’re very different [now],” says Alan Pardew, who will be forced to do without the suspended Cheick Tioté. “We were about possession-type football with Cabaye in the No10 role. We haven’t got that type of player now. We’re not going to be able to dictate like we did that day. We’re a different side with different attributes. But we have good pace on the break – at times, Manchester United could struggle.”

Jamie Jackson’s match preview: So impressive has been Manchester United’s resurgence under Louis van Gaal that the draw at Aston Villa was greeted by dismay by the manager and players after six consecutive wins in the league.

Newcastle United arrive having lost their past two, a resounding 4-1 defeat at Arsenal and the late 1-0 Tyne-Wear derby reverse, so their manager, Alan Pardew, is once again in need-of-a-win mode.