Brutal 48 hours for Newcastle as two former Mags complete full set - The latest

We may have found out the hard way that if we want to qualify for the Champions League this season, we can’t rely too much on other teams dropping points.

And we saw no better example of that between Saturday and Monday night, where our loss at Aston Villa was followed by several vital wins for our top five rivals.

It’s been a brutal 48 hours for us in terms of results for us, here’s how things stand with five games to go in the Premier League.

Toon leapfrogged on Monday night

Having helped push Nottingham Forest out of the top four for the first time since December, Nuno Santo’s side won on Monday night to send themselves back into 3rd place in the table.

Playing Spurs away on Monday night, sublime goals from none other than Elliot Anderson and Chris Wood made the difference as Forest earned a vital three points with a 2-1 win.

The result pushes us slightly back down into 4th place, a single point behind Forest, but we still retain a marginally superior goal difference.

On top of a bad weekend for Newcastle

Forest’s win over Spurs was the icing on the cake for what’s been a shockingly bad weekend of results for the Toon.

Man City showed their typically clutch mentality with a 2-0 win away at Goodison Park, and  Aston Villa obviously overcame us at Villa Park later that day.

Whilst Sunday didn’t make for much celebratory viewing either, as Chelsea completed a 2-1 comeback win over Fulham at Craven Cottage in a real snatch and grab performance from Enzo Maresca’s men.

The current race for Champions League football after Monday night’s game

All eyes on Villa vs City

The goal stays the same: we need to win as many points as possible, and we will have done all we can to cement our place in the top five.

In an ideal world, the huge clash between 5th place Man City and 7th place Aston Villa ends up in a draw: something that momentarily pushes us down to 5th place behind Pep Guardiola’s side, but stops either team gaining three valuable points.

Our recent loss to Unai Emery’s Villa will have served as a big wake up call to the whole team, and with a favourable game against Ipswich next up, that loss may just be the catalyst for us to finish the end of the season in excellent form.