Newcastle United secured promotion back to the Premier League with a 4-1 win over Preston North End at St James’ Park.
Although the scoreline, in the end, reflects how comfortable the last 25 minutes or so that the game was, it doesn’t tell the whole story.
Preston were right in the game for most of the first half after Jordan Hugill cancelled out Ayoze Perez’s opener, but on the stroke of half time, Christian Atsu put Newcastle in front.
The second half was hardly one-way traffic either but Newcastle’s job was made a whole lot easier when Paul Gallagher was sent off for a deliberate handball and Matt Ritchie scored the resulting penalty.
The result at that stage looked all but sealed and two minutes later, any remaining doubts were put to bed when Jonjo Shelvey’s corner kick hit the post, bounced onto Perez and into the goal.
On a wonderful night for the Magpies, here are our Newcastle player ratings from the game:
