NEWCASTLE: An early goal from Sandro Tonali and a late Bruno Guimaraes effort gave Newcastle United a 2-0 home win over Chelsea on Sunday that moves the Magpies a step closer to Champions League football next season, with Blues striker Nicholas Jackson denting his side’s hopes by being sent off in the first half.
The win leaves Newcastle in third spot on 66 points, three ahead of Chelsea, who hold the fifth and final Champions League spot with two games to play.
Aston Villa are level with Chelsea on points, with Nottingham Forest, who face already-relegated Leicester City later on Sunday, two points further back.
Newcastle were good value for their win but it was Jackson’s moment of madness that decided the game, robbing Chelsea of their best goal-scoring option in a game the Conference League finalists could not afford to lose if they wanted to be at Europe’s top table next season.
The Blues got off to a bad start when midfielder Tonali ghosted in at the far post to steer home a pass from Jacob Murphy in the second minute, delighting the home crowd as they basked in the bright sunshine.
Newcastle’s task appeared to get easier when Jackson had his initial yellow card upgraded to a red in the 35th minute after a long VAR review, with the replay showing that the Senegalese striker had looked in the direction of Newcastle’s Dan Burn before leading with his elbow toward the
defender’s face.
Despite going down to 10 men, Chelsea dominated for much of the second half, forcing Eddie Howe to make a number of changes to bolster the home side’s defense and, after withstanding Chelsea’s onslaught, Guimaraes finally sealed the three points with a deflected shot from outside the box in the 90th minute.
