‘Lucky’ - Wolves boss Gary O’Neil delivers surprise Newcastle United verdict

Gary O’Neil has revealed he is ‘proud’ of his side’s performance at St James’ Park on Saturday afternoon, but believes Newcastle United were ‘lucky’ to score two goals in the first-half. Alexander Isak opened the scoring after Bruno Guimaraes’ shot deflected into his path before Anthony Gordon capitalised on a mistake from Jose Sa to double their lead.

Wolves came to the north east having played on Sunday and Wednesday in both league and cup action and without both of their top scorers through injury. O’Neil, speaking after suffering his first defeat against the Magpies as a manager, said: “I’m really proud of the group and I thought they gave absolutely everything.

“We’ve had a tough week, a really good week, but a really tough week and a tough end to the week.

“Key players missing, a lot of young lads in and around it today, and we had large spells in the game where we looked really good, had lots of control, had loads of the ball, but two real slack moments for the goals cost us. They were lucky that both of them ended up costing us and two of them had large deflections on them, but one we left ourselves open on the counter-attack, which was really disappointing because we spoke about it and the second one was the pressing phase which we go slightly wrong.”

The win meant Newcastle United moved above Wolves in the table before their trip to Stamford Bridge on Monday 11 March.