Newcastle wins to push further clear of EPL's bottom three

NEWCASTLE, England (AP) — Ryan Fraser and Fabian Schar scored early for Newcastle as its English Premier League recovery survived a concerted Brighton fightback in a 2-1 win on Saturday.

The Magpies extended their unbeaten league run to eight games with a fifth win in six attempts — moving seven points clear of the relegation zone — but they did so largely against the run of play in a tense match at St James’ Park in front of a crowd of 52,214.

Brighton had lost none of the previous nine Premier League meetings between the sides and not conceded a single goal on Tyneside in the process, but the two they conceded courtesy of Fraser and Schar inside three first-half minutes ultimately proved decisive.

The visitors were the better side for much of the game and will feel they should have ended a sequence of three successive defeats, rather than stretching it to four, after captain Lewis Dunk headed them back into it 10 minutes after the restart.

Newcastle took the lead in the 12th when Chris Wood played the ball into Jacob Murphy’s path and the winger left defender Marc Cucurella trailing in his wake before lifting a shot over Robert Sanchez. The shot came back off the post but Fraser was on hand to give the home side a 12th-minute lead.

Only two more minutes had elapsed when the Seagulls were hit again, this time when Schar climbed highest to head Fraser’s right-wing free kick firmly past the keeper.

With Pascal Gross repeatedly finding space between the Newcastle lines to link with Danny Welbeck and Tariq Lamptey, Brighton continued to cause problems, and goalkeeper Martin Dubravka had to be at his best to prevent Welbeck from reducing the deficit after Lamptey had intercepted Joelinton’s ill-judged 29th-minute pass to