Crystal Palace have moved up to sixth in the Premier League table by thrashing struggling Newcastle United 5-1 at Selhurst Park.
Alan Pardew, facing his former side, named an unchanged team despite Palace's 1-0 home loss to Sunderland on Monday, and they dominated the opening minutes as Rob Elliot had to push away Jason Puncheon's dangerous drilled cross.
However, it was Newcastle who took the lead after just 10 minutes against the early run of play as Daryl Janmaat's inch-perfect cross found Papiss Cisse for the striker to head home his first goal since the opening day of the season amid questions of offside.
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If anything, that setback increased Palace's vigour, but it was with a stroke of luck that they brought themselves level again within four minutes as James McArthur's strike from outside the box took a wicked deflection off Paul Dummett to wrong-foot Elliot.
McArthur then fired over the bar from a similar position as the frantic start to the match continued, and with just 17 minutes on the clock the turnaround was complete when Connor Wickham's low cross found its way through to Yannick Bolasie, who slammed home.
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The Magpies were struggling to cope with the pace and trickery of Bolasie and Wilfried Zaha, and after the latter was booked for simulation when he went down in the box, he extended the advantage before the break.
Wickham drove past weak Newcastle challenges before lifting a cross towards Zaha on the penalty spot, and the winger hit a bouncing volley down into the ground and past the defender on the line to give Pardew's side a two-goal advantage at the whistle.
Newcastle had a golden opportunity to start a revival 30 seconds after the restart when Cisse could only fire over from Moussa Sissoko's low cross, but any slim hopes that the visitors had of launching a comeback were dashed moments later when Bolasie poked home from close range after Damien Delaney's flick-on.
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Palace were not content to settle, however, with Jason Puncheon whipping an effort narrowly over the bar and Bolasie missing a chance to seal his hat-trick, before Elliot had to tip Joel Ward's fierce drive over the crossbar as a beaten Newcastle reverted to damage limitation.
Substitute Siem de Jong did have a chance for the Magpies when his effort deflected narrowly wide off Scott Dann, but Palace added a fifth in injury time when McArthur pounced upon a loose ball as the Eagles moved up to sixth with a win which saw Newcastle slip back into the relegation zone.
Tom Nightingale
