Newcastle climb to third in the table with victory over Manchester United

Joe Willock and Callum Wilson combined to head Newcastle firmly into the race for Champions League qualification as they leapfrogged Manchester United into third place.

Willock’s 65th-minute header, his third goal of the season, and a second from substitute Wilson two minutes from time inflicted just a second defeat in 17 games in all competitions on Erik ten Hag’s side and gained a measure of revenge for February’s Carabao Cup final heartache at Wembley.

It was a deserved 2-0 victory too for the Magpies, who created the better chances in the game and might have gone ahead through Alexander Isak, Sean Longstaff and Willock before they broke the deadlock in front of a crowd of 52,268.

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— Newcastle United FC (@NUFC) April 2, 2023

They are now level on 50 points – one more than they collected during the whole of the last campaign – with United, but have a significantly better goal difference with both having 11 games to play.

Marcus Rashford, who had withdrawn from the England squad through injury, was named in Ten Hag’s starting line-up, while Eddie Howe kept faith with the 11 men who started the Magpies’ 2-1 win at Nottingham Forest last time out.

That meant only a seat on the bench for in-form midfielder Joelinton on his return from a two-match ban.

Both sides made early inroads in an enterprising start to the game with Rashford and Antony menacing in wide positions for the visitors as Isak stretched their defence.

Longstaff miskicked in front of goal after Isak had headed down Kieran Trippier’s sixth-minute cross at the end of a flowing counter-attack seconds after Sven Botman had dived in to block as Marcel Sabitzer burst into the Newcastle penalty area.

A fiercely-contested game saw both