The duality of Newcastle United on full display as Magpies take three points off Nottingham Forest - Just

Where to even start with that game? It was described in commentary on Sky Sports right at the end as a game of two halves, and that cliche barely even does it justice.

Nottingham Forest had the lead on six minutes after Callum Hudson-Odoi gratefully accepted the gift given to him via a combination of Tino Livramento's poor throw to Jacob Murphy, and Murphy being too weak in the challenge giving the ball away for Hudson-Odoi to fire a low effort from outside of the area into what was practically an open goal given Nick Pope's absolutely shocking positioning.

It felt like it was going to be one of those days for Newcastle again, however, a crazy 12-minute spell had Newcastle going from one goal down to 4-1 up.

Lewis Miley, making his first start of the season, levelled things for the Magpies with a superb left-footed finish inside the area that went through the legs of two Forest players before finding the corner on 23 minutes.

Newcastle went goal crazy in a 12-minute first-half spell

Just two minutes later, Jacob Murphy bundled home on the line for Newcastle's second after some stunning buildup play between Alexander Isak, Anthony Gordon and Lewis Hall.

Nottingham Forest full-back Ola Aina was penalised for a handball after his arm was adjudged to be in an unnatural position as he tried to block a Lewis Hall cross. It took VAR and a pitch-side viewing to award the penalty, which looked pretty obvious to everyone else, but it was given, and Alexander Isak went for a cheeky dink over former Newcastle keeper Matz Sels, who almost kept it out.

Isak put the icing on the first-half cake a couple of minutes later with a left-foot effort that deflected off a Forest defender and looped over Selz.

Newcastle might as well have stayed in the dressing room in the second half for how good they were

Newcastle were in complete control of the first half despite that early wobble, but as good as they were in that half, they were at the same level of poor in the second, and vice versa for Forest.

Nikola Milenkovic back-heeled beyond Nick Pope just after the hour mark, and Forest kept pressing and pushing while Newcastle failed in every action to keep them at bay.

It seemed inevitable that Forest would score again, which they did, but fortunately for Newcastle, it came too late in the game with the loathsome Ryan Yates poking home on 90 minutes.

Lewis Hall had one of his best games for Newcastle today

I went from planning a headline about Newcastle chopping down Forest in the first half to wondering how not to sound so negative about a win.

There were some big positives to take from the game, obviously. Lewis Hall was in inspired form as was Joe Willock, who was taken off after the hour but ran himself into the ground for the cause before that.

Alexander Isak caught up to and then overtook Chris Wood in the race for the Golden Boot while hitting 50 Premier League goals for Newcastle, becoming the seventh quickest player to hit a half century in the Premier League.

Unfortunately, the second half was littered with negatives. There was no desire to play the same game they played in the first half, the passing was sloppy all over the pitch and pretty much everyone was bullied by their Forest counterparts.

It's three points at the end of the day. That gap between the two sides has been reduced to three points, and Newcastle is back up to fifth. There's work for Eddie Howe to do, a lot of work, but we can at least enjoy the win.