Newcastle United’s captain, Jamaal Lascelles, spared his goalkeeper Karl Darlow’s blushes with an 81st-minute equaliser to earn them a 2-2 draw in a pulsating match with Norwich City at Carrow Road which left the Championship leaders a point clear of Brighton who were held at home by Ipswich Town.
It was an error by Darlow that had enabled Norwich to lead at half-time after they had recovered from conceding a goal by Ayoze Pérez after only 23 seconds. Under little pressure Darlow had sliced a clearance straight to Cameron Jerome who tapped the ball into an unguarded net in the 17th minute.
Such a turnround had seemed unlikely after the impressive start made by Rafael Benítez’s side who had caught Norwich cold with their first attack. Static defending allowed Jack Colback to pick out Pérez just inside the box and the Spaniard produced a cool, low finish to beat John Ruddy. They should have added to that in the fifth minute when a slip from Russell Martin let Aleksandar Mitrovic to race clear but Ruddy did well to block the shot.
However, a mistake by Newcastle allowed Norwich to level matters. Lascelles was caught in possession by Jerome when he should have cleared and the striker squared for Jacob Murphy to side-foot in from close range.
After Darlow had handed Norwich the lead Newcastle responded and it took an excellent reaction save from Ruddy to keep out a powerful header from Mitrovic.
Norwich then went close to increasing their advantage as Newcastle were again found wanting at the back but Steven Whittaker shot inches wide.
There was still time for Mitrovic to fire a close-range effort against a post and Norwich’s Jonny Howson to curl a long-range shot narrowly wide before the end of a frenetic first half.
Newcastle were almost level eight minutes into the second half when Matt Ritchie slammed the ball against the crossbar from inside the six-yard box after being set up by DeAndre Yedlin.
The Magpies were enjoying the bulk of possession, with Norwich now defending well, although they lived dangerously again after 73 minutes when Mitrovic got to the byline but was unable to pick out a colleague in the box,
Newcastle finally found a way through when Norwich failed to deal with an inswinging free-kick from Jonjo Shelvey. The ball reached Pérez, who crossed for Lascelles to volley home at the far post.
Shelvey almost bundled home a late winner and Ruddy denied first Pérez and then Shelvey in added time.
Afterwards Benítez praised his players character. He said: “I thought we responded brilliantly to going behind – the character of the players, and their reaction to the setbacks, was the most positive thing for me tonight. We had a lot of supporters in the corner and I am sure they will have enjoyed the effort the players put in.”
The Norwich manager, Alex Neil, was pleased with the way his side reacted to their early setback. “To be honest there are mixed emotions after that,” he said. “Obviously you are not expecting to concede a goal in the first minute and we were really nervy in the first five minutes. “But once we got our goal and then got ahead I thought we were excellent. The response from the players was top-class.”
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