Eddie Howe had some huge Newcastle calls justified, while West Ham were all out of luck and Tolo Arokodare has long hair.<\/p>\n
Newcastle might finally have extricated themselves from a relegation battle<\/strong><\/a> they accidentally slipped into.<\/p>\n Sunderland are also safe after a forgettable draw at Molineux; West Ham are not.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Brentford 3 West Ham 0 \u2013 Nuno luck for struggling Hammers<\/strong><\/p>\n It is difficult to recall such a thoroughly Just Not Our Day game than that suffered by West Ham against Brentford.<\/p>\n They hit the woodwork four times, had two strong penalty shouts overlooked, had one goal marginally ruled out for offside and were outshot 14 to 13 in an eventual 3-0 defeat.<\/p>\n With Arsenal next and a potentially reinvigorated Newcastle at St James\u2019 Park after that, it does feel as though everything might hinge on that final weekend showdown with Leeds.<\/p>\n Spurs face Daniel Farke\u2019s home-and-dry side<\/strong><\/a>, as well as a distracted Aston Villa and Liam McFarlane\u2019s Chelsea, before their season-closer at home to Everton.<\/p>\n The gap between the relegation battlers remains two points; it will be no consolation to West Ham that a greater rub of the green against Brentford would have increased it to five.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Wolves 1 Sunderland 1 \u2013 two sides split by a hair\u2019s breadth<\/strong><\/p>\n Three goals in 30 appearances does not ordinarily lend itself to much of a Premier League legacy, but Tolu Arokodare is indelibly linked to one of the more laborious trends in the modern history of the English top flight.<\/p>\n The FA\u2019s directive that \u201cin the wider interests of football \u2018hair pulling\u2019 ought not to be tolerated and should be discouraged through consistent punishment\u201d has centred largely around the follicle-based challenges of and on the Wolves striker, Dominic Calvert-Lewin and Marc Cucurella<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n Sunderland defender Dan Ballard joined Everton centre-half Michael Keane in receiving his marching orders for an alleged tug at Arokodare\u2019s dreadlocks this season, with David Moyes handily summing the situation up a few months ago.<\/p>\n \u201cIt is not violent, it is not forceful and it is not deliberate so all of those things I have said mean it shouldn\u2019t have been a red card,\u201d he said after a repeat of this game: a 1-1 draw in which Wolves failed to take advantage of their opponent having a man sent off for an aerial duel with Arokodare.<\/p>\n \u201cI have been a centre-half and there is no way I am jumping to out-jump a big centre-forward and think: \u2018By the way I am going to out-jump him and at the same time I am going to pull his hair\u2019,\u201d Moyes added.<\/p>\n With that red card and two goals scored by defenders from corners, it was a painfully 2025\/26 Premier League experience.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Newcastle 3 Brighton 1 \u2013 Controversial Howe calls justified<\/strong><\/p>\n Eddie Howe was eager to stress that his meeting with the Newcastle owners this week was an annual tradition, rather than any panicked reaction to an ongoing crisis.<\/p>\n That the Magpies were able to schedule a season review in April was perhaps the most damning assessment possible. Howe said he would be \u201cchallenged and probed on certain decisions\u201d he\u2019s made and \u201chow we\u2019ve ended up in certain scenarios,\u201d but might have struggled to justify his team selection against Brighton.<\/p>\n The result and aspects of the performance offered the strongest possible defence. \u201cI don\u2019t pick the team based on transfer fees,\u201d Howe said recently, as a \u00a3356m bench watching a \u00a3279.6m starting line-up attested.<\/p>\n But the calls were validated, first by Will Osula heading into an empty net after exceptional work from Jacob Murphy, then by Dan Burn granting the hosts a two-goal lead from a corner.<\/p>\n Even those expensive substitutes came into play when Yoane Wissa rode a Paul van Hecke challenge to play Harvey Barnes in to round off an absurd topsy-turvy end to a game Newcastle had to win.<\/p>\n After Jack Hinshelwood\u2019s wonderful goal on the hour, Brighton pushed for an equaliser and came agonisingly close. It was summed up by a final ten minutes in which there were seven shots \u2013 all from different players \u2013 including a daft Charalampos Kostoulas overhead kick.<\/p>\n The last, with Barnes firing into a net vacated by Bart Verbruggen once again, finally sealed a win Newcastle and Howe in particular desperately needed.<\/p>\n