Jamaal's A Cut Above The Rest

By Anthony Marshall - Newcastle United Managing Editor

Captain Jamaal Lascelles was a cut above the rest for Newcastle United on Saturday - putting his first goal of the season down to a new hairstyle.

The centre-back headed home Matt Ritchie's free-kick to give the Magpies' an early lead against Brighton & Hove Albion at St. James' Park, which was doubled by Jonjo Shelvey's second half set-piece.

As he ran towards the south-east corner of the stadium to celebrate, Lascelles appeared to be highlighting the name on the back of his shirt.

But the 22-year-old revealed he was actually pointing at the ponytail that now sits on top of his head, after receiving some friendly stick from fans earlier in the week.

"I'd had my old trim for a while so I thought I would mix it up and I ended up with this," Lascelles explained to nufc.co.uk.

"It got me a goal so maybe it's lucky. If that's the case, I'll keep it for a while.

"All the lads liked it. I got a few tweets from people saying 'what's he got on his head', which is why when I was celebrating I was pointing at it in front of the fans. It was just a bit of banter though.

"It was great so score. I told Matty to aim for me, he did and thankfully I was in the right position to get a clean header.

"It's always nice to ge tthe first goal because then you don't need to be open at the back. You can become more compact.

"Last season we conceded too many early goals and then lost our heads, but we've learned, we are scoring early goals and then defending well."

United were outstanding against previously-unbeaten Brighton, recording a fourth successive victory in all competitions and a third clean sheet in a row.

They now sit fourth in the Sky Bet Championship going into the international break but Lascelles insists there is still more to come from the in-form Magpies.

"We've got good momentum at the minute but more importantly, the team is really starting to gel together," said the defender.

"Those three points are massive. Everyone knows Brighton are a great team. They are really strong on set pieces, which we defended well, and for us to beat them was great.

"Everyone played a massive role and everyone did their jobs, so credit to the boys.

"It was a good performance but we all know we've got a lot more to offer.

"Okay, we won, but we're not going to take our foot off the gas now. We're going to keep working hard to make sure we are on top of our game every week and pushing on as a team.

"It's starting to come together nicely and it's only going to get better."