Ayoze Pérez hat-trick allows Newcastle to ride out Southampton revival

Newcastle United fans are unlikely to find even the richest, most indulgent Easter egg remotely as satisfying as the evening that rubber-stamped their team’s Premier League status for another season.

A yellow card that should have been red, a smart second half switch to 4-4-2, two clever substitutions and four dramatic goals, three of them scored by Ayoze Pérez, this was a game that kept on giving. Indeed it was so good that for 90 minutes home fans all but forgot about the enduring impasse between Rafael Benitez and Newcastle’s owner Mike Ashley over negotiations to extend a managerial contract which expires in June. By the final whistle Perez had registered his first hat-trick in English football and nagging, albeit slim, relegation worries still lingered on for a Southampton side who started and finished badly but impressed in-between.

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