**Newcastle United made it three Champions League wins on the bounce tonight as they beat a depleted Athletic Club side 2-0 under the lights at St James' Park.**
It wasn't pretty, and as seems to be the way lately, we made hard work of it, but a win is a win, and it was the response we wanted after Sunday's defeat.
As we said, it's not going to go down as a classic, and a lot of the result can be put down to how weakened Athletic Bilbao were. They did put up a spirited fight, but Newcastle just had that extra bit of quality on the night.
Newcastle were 1-0 up after 11 minutes when Dan Burn scored the greatest headed goal you're ever likely to see. Kieran Trippier whipped a free-kick to the far side of the penalty area, and Dan Burn, who was left completely open, nodded back across goal and somehow managed to bend the ball into the far corner. How one bends a header, I do not know.
What a goal from Big Dan Burn!
Why did Anthony Gordon even start for Newcastle tonight?
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From then on, Newcastle reverted to type, giving the ball away and making life difficult for themselves and living off good fortune as Athletic hit the post twice.
Newcastle lost Anthony Gordon midway through the first half, too, as the hip injury that caused Eddie Howe to take him off at the interval on Sunday proved to be too much for the England winger.
You could tell from minute one he wasn't right. Serious questions have to be asked as to why he was even selected.
Buzzing with the win, worried by the lack of killer instinct
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Newcastle made it into the break with their lead intact, and then came out for the second half looking like they had a point to prove. Joelinton soon doubled the lead, nodding home a Harvey Barnes cross, and it looked as though the Magpies were set up to go on from there and have fun with it.
Unfortunately, that wasn't the case. Newcastle are just lacking that killer instinct of late, and we have no idea why. I know it seems odd to be pulling apart the performance after a huge 2-0 win in Europe's top competition, but with an eye on Sunday, away at Brentford, I just can't see us getting anything if we don't pick ourselves up.
The win keeps Newcastle in the automatic qualification places in the Champions League, moving up to sixth in the table.
Now we need to get ourselves pulled together to go again on Sunday. We're more than happy to win ugly like we did tonight. We're not demanding silky football; despite how it sounds, we just want to know why we look so far off what we know we're capable of.
Anyway, I'm away to eat my words after ragging on Joelinton all week. It was a quality goal by the Brazilian, and it made up for some of the shocking misses in the first half.