Sandro Tonali of Newcastle United celebrates scoring his team's first goal during the UEFA Champions League 2025/26 League Knockout Play-off Second Leg match between Newcastle United FC and Qarabag FK at St James' Park on February 24, 2026 in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. (Photo by Carl Recine/Getty Images)placeholder image
Sandro Tonali of Newcastle United celebrates scoring his team's first goal during the UEFA Champions League 2025/26 League Knockout Play-off Second Leg match between Newcastle United FC and Qarabag FK at St James' Park on February 24, 2026 in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. (Photo by Carl Recine/Getty Images) | Getty Images
Sandro Tonali scored the opener in Newcastle United’s 3-2 Champions League play-off second-leg win over Qarabag.
Leading 6-1 from the first-leg win in Azerbaijan following four goals from Anthony Gordon and a goal each from Malick Thiaw and Jacob Murphy, it took the Magpies just four minutes to open the scoring at St James’ Park.
Will Osula’s header was saved by Mateusz Kocahlski but Tonali reacted quickest to poke home. Less than two minutes later, it was 2-0 on the night as Joelinton converted Harvey Barnes’ cross.
It was a comfortable first-half but the game turned scrappy in the second. Camilo Duran pulled one back in the 51st minute in what Tonali described as a “stupid” goal to concede.
The Qarabag striker got the better of Dan Burn for pace and slotted past Aaron Ramsdale. Elvin Jafarguliyev then scored another for the visitors just moments after Sven Botman made it 3-1.
Sandro Tonali reacts to Newcastle United’s 3-2 win over Qarabag
Reflecting on the win, Tonali said: "It was a very great game for the first 10 minutes. I'm not very happy with the second half because we play just with the result because we scored nine goals but we had to do more because these fans deserve 100 per cent for 90 minutes every game.
“For me, the second half was very good but we can do 100 per cent more and we need to push every minute of the game.
"The first thing was don't concede a goal and the second half first 10 minutes we concede the first goal and it was a stupid goal.
“Every time we concede a goal we are not happy. But finally we are happy because we pass through in the Champions League and we deserve this one because we trained a lot for this.
"Last season we worked very tough every day, every weekend to play Champions League this season, we deserve everything."
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