Aston Villa 1-0 Newcastle United
Last Updated: Sun, 24 May 2009 18:14
Newcastle are relegated from the Premier League after an own goal from the unfortunate Damien Duff handed Aston Villa a 1-0 victory.
The build-up had been immense, particularly in the North-East where the hope from the City of Newcastle was that Alan Shearer would somehow drag the Magpies out of the relegation zone and steer them to Premier League survival. Newcastle fans travelled to Villa Park in expectation that their side would put on a display to match their lofty ambitions, however it simply never materialised.
Martin O'Neill's Villa side flew out of the blocks and Gabriel Agbonlahor gave Fabricio Coloccini the runaround for fifteen minutes in which the England striker could have had a hat-trick.
For a while the men in black and white appeared to be ready to battle their way to safety and Damien Duff had a shot turned around the post by Brad Friedel, the American goalkeeper's last action of the match.
Within a matter of moments though Villa had regained the momentum and panic had set in amongst a makeshift Newcastle back four, so when Gareth Barry hit a speculative drive from 30 yards it came as no surprise that Duff stuck out a leg to send the ball spinning out of Steve Harper's reach and into the bottom corner. With 38 minutes gone there was time for Newcastle to rescue the situation, but Villa were too strong.
As the second half played out, energy and belief drained out of the visitors and Villa should have made the game safe on numerous occasions with John Carew the main culprit.
Their fate was sealed in the final moments when David Edgar was dismissed for a second bookable offence as he hauled down a marauding Ashley Young.
The result condemns Newcastle to the Championship and they can really have no complaints on a day when they failed to threaten Villa regularly enough and eventually bowed out of the top flight with a whimper.