Newcastle pile pressure on Pierre Sage with victory at Palace; Brentford and Hull draw

Crystal Palace 0-2 Newcastle

Hull City 1-1 Brentford 

WILLIAM OSULA AND Harvey Barnes scored early in the second half at Selhurst Park as Newcastle dealt Crystal Palace a frustrating 2-0 Premier League defeat to pile more pressure on Pierre Sage.

The Eagles settled for an encouraging 2-2 Europa League draw at Besiktas on Thursday night, showing signs of a positive response to last Sunday’s 5-0 drubbing at Brighton.

Palace had a few opportunities to take the lead early in a first half largely devoid of chances for either side, before conceding less than two minutes after the restart.

It was Osula’s seventh goal in his last 13 Premier League matches after scoring two in his first 50.

Joe Willock had a second goal chalked off by VAR soon after, before Barnes doubled the Magpies’ advantage two minutes before the hour.

Newcastle survived an early goalmouth scramble, and there was an effort for Daichi Kamada, who celebrated 100 Eagles appearances on Thursday night, that was deflected wide off of Jean-Philippe Mateta.

The French striker, who returned to Sage’s starting line-up on Thursday night, then directed an attempt of his own just wide in the 12th minute.

Lukas Hornicek punched away a Palace cross, and Dwight McNeil sent the ball across the face of goal around the 20-minute mark, but he could not connect with a teammate.

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It was still a positive opening to the contest for Sage, whose side conceded three times in the opening 10 minutes at Brighton.

Opportunities remained limited, save Dan Burn’s half-chance from a header, by the half-hour mark, and it was goalless at the break after Tyrick Mitchell had a shot blocked by Burn, and Hornicek collected Yeremy Pino’s cross-shot.

It took less than two minutes for Osula to break the deadlock after the restart, latching onto a pinpoint Jacob Murphy cross and prodding home.

Willock thought he had doubled the scoring less than five minutes later, but the goal was disallowed after a VAR check deemed him to be offside.

It remained all Newcastle, whose pressure paid off two minutes before the hour when Palace did not do enough to prevent Amar Dedic from teeing up Barnes, who swept home.

Palace were briefly sparked back to life as Hornicek punched away an Anan Khalaili cross, then saved an Adam Wharton effort with a diving stop before denying substitute Dario Osorio with 20 minutes remaining.

There was a VAR check for a red card against Pino, who was able to continue, and a lengthy pause in stoppage time to treat Malick Thiaw.

Palace never looked close to finding their way back, and boos rang down from sections of the home support when the final whistle blew.

Elsewhere, Hull’s unbeaten home record remains intact after a 1-1 draw with Keith Andrews’ Brentford at the MKM Stadium.

The opening goal came courtesy of a 24th-minute Oli McBurnie penalty, awarded when Aaron Hickey hooked his leg through Tim Iroegbunam’s to flatten him inside the area.

McBurnie picked out the bottom right of the net and though Brentford’s Caoimhin Kelleher guessed right, he could not get in the way of his opponent’s first Premier League goal for over 900 days.

After the break Hull were left to rue some inattentive defending as Igor Thiago found his way to Dango Ouattara, who slotted the ball home under very little pressure at all to make it 1-1 in the 63rd minute.