Ritchie stars as Newcastle hit back to down Arsenal

NEWCASTLE, United Kingdom: Arsenal crashed to a fifth consecutive away defeat in the Premier League as Matt Ritchie fired Newcastle to a 2-1 win at St James’ Park on Sunday.

Arsene Wenger’s side took an early lead through Alexandre Lacazette, but Ayoze Perez equalised before Ritchie bagged the second half winner.Newcastle’s fourth successive win ended Arsenal’s unbeaten run of seven games in all competitions.

With little to play for in the league, Arsenal were unable to find enough momentum to maintain their recent revival, even though Lacazette opened the scoring in the 14th minute.Just moments after he was left writhing on the turf following a crunching challenge from Kenedy, Lacazette exacted revenge.

Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang ran onto a long ball into the Newcastle area and picked out Lacazette, who stretched to volley home at the far post for his 13th goal of a difficult first season following his move from Lyon.

Perez made a perfectly-timed run to meet Yedlin’s cross with a fine finish that flashed by Petr Cech at his near post.The Spanish forward’s third goal in his last three appearances was a clinical effort, but Wenger would have been furious with how easily Newcastle carved open his defence.

Ritchie tested Cech before 18-year-old Arsenal midfielder Joe Willock’s poor finish wasted an opportunity to mark his Premier League debut with a goal.It was Newcastle who landed the knockout blow in the 68th minute.

More sloppy Arsenal defending let in Islam Slimani and his header was flicked on by Perez to Ritchie, who beat Cech from close-range.Ritchie clearly saves his goals for the big occasion, having scored the winner against Manchester United in February.

Lacazette should have equalised in the closing stages, but he shot into the side-netting.

On Saturday, Manchester City bounced back from a bitterly disappointing week to beat Tottenham Hotspur 3-1 at Wembley.Gabriel Jesus raced in behind an unsettled Spurs defence to drill home the opener on 22 minutes and Ilkay Gundogan slotted home the second from the penalty spot three minutes later as Hugo Lloris wiped out Raheem Sterling, although replays suggested the contact took place outside the area.

City threatened to let another promising position slip away when Christian Eriksen brought Spurs back into the game just before the break with a bit of fortune when Aymeric Laporte’s clearance ricocheted off the Dane and past the helpless Ederson. However, this time there was no second-half collapse as City should have ran out even more convincing winners.

Jesus and Sterling passed up huge chances to add to their lead before Sterling — who also missed two great opportunities when City were 2-0 up on United last weekend — finally found the roof of the net after Lloris parried another Jesus effort.

Liverpool strengthened their position in the top four as Mohamed Salah scored his 40th goal of the season in a routine 3-0 win over Bournemouth.All of Liverpool’s prolific front three were on target as Sadio Mane and Roberto Firmino struck either side of Salah’s deft header to take their combined tally for the season to 82.