Newcastle United cling on to take three points after late 10-man Burnley mount late surge
Newcastle United can never just do things the easy way, can they? The Magpies conceded yet another stoppage-time goal in the second half, this time giving away a penalty to do so, as if it is now a trademark that they have to concede late in the game or something.
Eddie Howe made six changes to the lineup today with one eye on the Champions League game in midweek and the derby at the weekend.
If there was a game where he should have been comfortable making changes, it is against woeful Burnley at home, though, so we can see why he did it.
We joked before kick-off that Eddie Howe was trying to throw the match, but in all honesty, it was Burnley who were doing that for us, despite making a really good start to the game.
Bruno Guimaraes scored directly from a corner. The cheeky Brazilian.
Burnley were relentless in the opening minutes, and they had corner kicks stacking up as they kept pushing. Eventually, though, Newcastle had a corner of their own and that changed the whole flow of the game.
Bruno Guimaraes took the corner on 31 and pinged an inch-perfect in-swinging corner directly into the far post. He's been trying to do that a lot this season, and it finally paid off for him.
Things got even better for Newcastle on 43 minutes when Lucas Pires brought down a lively Anthony Elanga on the edge of the box and was given his marching orders as a result.
Then, just a couple of minutes later, Lesley Ugochukwu thought he was playing volleyball as he spiked the ball in his own box, giving Newcastle a penalty in first-half stoppage time, which was once again put away brilliantly by Anthony Gordon.
Newcastle were pretty poor in the second half, considering their one-man advantage
We almost had an entire second half without any highlights. Anthony Gordon did hit the crossbar, his second time striking the woodwork.
Yoane Wissa made his debut. But other than that, it was an entirely unremarkable second half as Newcastle coasted to victory.
At least that would have been the case had someone told Jacob Ramsey we weren't playing rush keeper. Stuart Attwell blew for the second penalty of the game, both for handball, and Zian Flemming made no mistake from 12 yards.
We'd love to be able to just celebrate a win without having to rant about a load of negatives. Today isn't that day.
Newcastle's inability to see out a game is a huge concern, as is the fact that they always seem to struggle to press home the advantage against 10 men.
Jacob Ramsey was already going to get a pasting in this report before he conceded that penalty. Anthony Elanga looked bright today, and although he once again drew a blank in terms of goal contributions, we can't fault his endeavour, whereas Ramsey did put the effort in, but just wasn't good enough in any area of the pitch.
On the whole, though, a win is a win, but that suckerpunch at the end took the shine off it, and the fact that we almost conceded with the last kick of the game really doesn't inspire confidence.
We shouldn't be moaning after a win, but until this team starts looking like they give a crap, we'll keep doing it.
