Newcastle United midfielder Bruno Guimaraes scored twice to help his side to a 5-1 win over Brentford at St James’ Park on Saturday as they moved up to fifth in the Premier League, a year and a day after the Saudi Arabia-backed takeover of the club.
Bryan Mbeumo had a 10th-minute goal for the visitors chalked off after a VAR review found Ivan Toney to be offside in the build-up, and 11 minutes later Guimaraes stooped to score with a superb header from Kieran Trippier’s cross in the 21st minute.
Jacob Murphy added a second shortly afterwards as Brentford’s defence came unstuck while trying to play out from the back, with Callum Wilson snapping up a loose ball and squaring to Murphy, who slammed it home first-time.
Brentford were awarded a penalty for a handball by Dan Burn early in the second half, and Ivan Toney, who never established himself during a three-year spell at Newcastle, stepped up to stroke home the spot kick.
Guimaraes quickly snuffed out any hope of a comeback, winning the ball out on the wing before advancing and firing home a wonderful solo goal two minutes later.
That took the sting out of Brentford and, having gone close with an early first-half effort, Miguel Almiron got the goal his industry deserved in the 82nd minute after Brentford again gave away possession in their own half.
Ethan Pinnock rounded off a miserable afternoon for the visitors’ defence when he turned Joelinton’s cross into his own net in the 90th minute.
The win lifts Newcastle, who were 19th when the takeover was sealed on Oct. 7 last year, up to fifth spot in the standings on 14 points, four ahead of 12th-placed Brentford.
“Today was a tough game. Brentford make it very difficult for you. We had a bit of a slow start but the first goal changed everything from our perspective,” Newcastle coach Eddie Howe told the BBC.
“If you look where the goals came from today our intensity and pressing, we forced them into errors and we got rewarded for that… overall, a great day for us,” he added.
Brentford boss Thomas Frank was disappointed with his side’s sloppy display.
“If you want to win football matches it is relatively important you don’t make one, two, three, or four mistakes leading to goals. To make four mistakes then you lose football games and basically that is it,” he told the BBC.
