Woeful and gutless Newcastle thoroughly beaten by classy Crystal Palace on bad night for Eddie Howe

Newcastle United were on the end of a deserved defeat at Selhurst Park tonight as Crystal Palace secured Premier League football next season with a 2-0 win.

Crystal Palace were by far the better side from the kick-off as Newcastle looked defeated before any meaningful action had taken place. There seemed to be a massive reluctance to play the ball forward with so many passes being played across the backline.

Then, when forward passes were played, they rarely found their intended target as Palace were, to a man, simply better than Newcastle, more alert, more alive and more hungry.

It may just be the post-match blues, but that definitely felt like it was one of Newcastle's worst performances of the season, if not the worst. Zero shots on target from just three attempts after 85 minutes tells its own story.

We have to point the finger at Eddie Howe for this one

Eddie Howe stuck with the same team and same weird formation that worked against Tottenham last week, but as we said before kick-off, Crystal Palace didn't feel like the right team to deploy those same tactics against, and it proved to be true. Jean-Philippe Mateta continued his fine form with two goals, but it was Eberechi Eze who was the main pest, running through our side like they were training dummies.

We could, and were it not for Mateta bagging his second goal of the night, we would have been talking about the VAR shambles that saw a blatant penalty not awarded when Sean Longstaff was pulled down in the box, but in reality, we didn't deserve it. If we'd been given that spot kick and gone on to snatch a point from the game it would have been nothing short of blatant robbery.

Speaking of Mateta's second goal - Longstaff once again went to ground with nothing given, although probably rightly so this time, our defence was completely asleep and Mateta demonstrated exactly why Martin Dubravka needs to be sold this summer. I've seen fog with more structural integrity.

Manchester United have opened up a three-point gap in the race for Europe

Remind us in the future to never, ever, under any circumstances, declare when we are feeling confident going into a game because all it does is curse us.

To rub salt into the wounds, Manchester United twice came from behind to eventually beat Sheffield United 4-2 so they've now opened up a gap in the race for sixth, making that rescheduled game in May look even more massive.

The Magpies have Sheffield United next too, and after sticking eight past them earlier in the season, we will be hoping for something similar again at home, but honestly, after whatever that display was tonight, we'd be happy enough with a 1-0 win.