Newcastle v Benfica, Getty Images October 22, 2025, 00:02

The famous Portuguese specialist Jose Mourinho at the head of the Turkish Fenerbahce failed to make it to the main round of the UEFA Champions League this season due to the defeat in the play-off qualification against Benfica of Lisbon. However, the further fate of the helmsman developed in such an interesting way that he was fired from the Canaries, and then for the second time in his career was appointed to work as the head coach of the Eagles.

So “Special” did get into the main grid, but his new team at that time already had a sensational defeat against the Azerbaijani Karabakh (2:3), and then, led by Jose Benfica, they also unsuccessfully traveled to Stamford Bridge (0:1), which is clearly not a stranger to its helmsman. The situation is not the most pleasant, to put it mildly, especially since in the third round the Lisbon team had to go to England again, but to the north, and play away against Newcastle.

Meanwhile, Eddie Gau’s team felt quite confident, even with the opening defeat against Barcelona (1:2), because immediately after that, the “magpies” defeated the Belgian Union (4:0), so they could claim much better places than their opponents according to the reported confrontation.

However, directly on the field of St. James Park, they were thinking about categories that are more relevant to the game, and there it was clear from the course of the first half that the guests were noticeably inferior to the hosts. Newcastle tried to act as quickly as possible in the transition phases, while Benfica, meanwhile, focused on maximizing the width of their own attacks. Both teams worked well, the game was attack after attack, very dynamic football, but at the 32nd minute, a breakthrough began in favor of the Gau team.

Newcastle pressed the “Eagles” with pressing, and immediately Bruno launched a counterattack to the right flank of Murphy, who then executed a cross into an empty net for Gordon at the far post. All of Anatoly Trubin’s saves after the standards from the hosts thus instantly lost their value, except that at that moment his team could have conceded with a much larger score.

The visitors had Lukebakio on the right flank of the attack, while Sudakov could not show off on the opposite side of the field. However, Dodi was simply unlucky with his shots from any position, because if not Pope, then the opponent’s stable goal became an obstacle to potential goals. The goalkeeper of Newcastle, by the way, not only excelled in saving his own goal, but also helped the team’s attack.

At the 71st minute, a counterattack on the right wing began with a long throw-in from the “magpie” goalkeeper, which was calmly completed by Barnes, because he had a significant advantage in speed over all opponents. And in 12 minutes, the fresh Harvey already had a double on his account, as the restless Gordon and Voltemade played a combination on him with an exit under the shot on the same right wing of the penalty area.

And then it was already Trubin’s role to save his own team from a complete rout, because at the score of 3:0, Newcastle did not think of stopping. But the goalkeeper of the national team of Ukraine did stop the “magpie”. Sumptuous long-range strikes from Joelinton and Byrne, coupled with a close-range header from Bothman, and a number of similar chances from the home team thus left the hosts without a final score. Although Mourinho made it clear that his team was already broken by the lack of substitutions at the end of the match.

In the next round, English Newcastle will host Basque Athletic, and Lisbon Benfica will play at home against Bayer Leverkusen.

Benfica: Trubin — Dedych (Ivanovich, 63), T. Araujo, Otamendi, A. Silva, Aursnes — Rios, Barrenechea — Lukebakio, Pavlidis, Sudakov.

Warning: Tiaw — Lukebakio