BIRMINGHAM, England (AP) — Aston Villa striker Ollie Watkins proved too hot to handle for the best defence in the Premier League as he scored two goals and set up another in a 3-0 win over Newcastle on Saturday.
Watkins' latest brilliant performance came in front of England coach Gareth Southgate, who didn't call up the striker for the national team's most recent matches last month.
Watkins is in the form of his life, however, and took his tally to 11 goals in his last 12 league games by swiveling on the edge of the six-yard box and smashing home a finish to make it 2-0 in the 64th minute. He added a third in the 83rd from a close-range shot that took a slight deflection.
He also had a goal disallowed for a narrow offside when the score was 1-0, while in the first half he struck the post inside the first minute and set up Jacob Ramsey for the 11th-minute opener with an intelligent nod-down from a looping cross from the right.
Watkins has 14 goals this season, 12 of them coming since the World Cup.
The defeat was a blow to third-place Newcastle's chances of Champions League qualification, with Villa now potentially having a chance of a top-four finish.
Transformed under Unai Emery, Villa is in sixth place after seven wins in its last eight games and now six points behind Newcastle having played one game more.
Newcastle has only conceded 24 goals in 30 league games this season, the fewest of any team in the division.
Bournemouth 3, Tottenham 2
In London, Tottenham's hopes of qualifying for the Champions League were dented after a 3-2 loss to Bournemouth following Dango Ouattara’s stoppage-time winner.
A wild Premier League game was won by the visitors after goals by Matias Vina and Dominic Solanke were added to by substitute Ouattara. It earned the Cherries some revenge after their late pain in the reverse fixture in October.
It capped a bad afternoon for Spurs acting head coach Cristian Stellini, who substituted a substitute — Davinson Sanchez — after the defender's poor 23-minute cameo and saw his aggressive tactics cost his team. Tottenham had six attackers on the field in the final minutes.
Tottenham remained in fifth but has Aston Villa just three points behind and a critical three-game week against top-four rivals Newcastle and Manchester United coming up. Tottenham chairman Daniel Levy faced more chants during the team's 10th defeat of the league season.
Brighton & Hove Albion 2, Chelsea 1
In London, Frank Lampard’s disappointing start to his second spell as Chelsea manager continued as the team lost 2-1 at home to Brighton.
Julio Enciso’s 69th-minute, long-range piledriver secured victory for the visitors, who outplayed Chelsea as Lampard rang the changes for a match taking place between his team’s home-and-away games against Real Madrid in the Champions League quarterfinals.
Lampard has taken charge of three games since coming in as interim manager following the firing of Graham Potter, and he’s lost all of them. First there was a 1-0 loss at Wolverhampton last weekend before a 2-0 defeat at Madrid on Wednesday.
This was Lampard's first game at Stamford Bridge and Chelsea took the lead against the run of play, with Conor Gallagher’s shot from the edge of the area deflecting off Brighton defender Lewis Dunk and wrong-footing recalled goalkeeper Robert Sanchez in the 13th.
Danny Welbeck came on as a substitute for the injured striker Evan Ferguson and equalized in the 42nd, heading in from Pascal Gross’ right-wing cross.
Enciso, a 19-year-old Paraguayan forward, was another first-half substitute because of an injury to Joel Veltman and he scored for the second time this season when he drove forward and fired a rising shot into the top corner from a central position 30 metres out. Enciso was lifted onto the shoulders of his teammates as he celebrated in front of Brighton's fans.
Brighton stayed in seventh place.
Chelsea, after a spending spree of $630 million over the last two transfer windows, is languishing in 11th place.
Fulham 3, Everton 1
In Liverpool, Fulham ended an alarming run of Premier League defeats by beating Everton 3-1, as Marco Silva claimed a first win against his former employers to damage their attempt to avoid relegation.
Harrison Reed put the Cottagers ahead midway through the first half but Everton hit back through Dwight McNeil and seemed the likeliest to score again before halftime at Goodison Park.
But the momentum swung back toward Fulham when Harry Wilson put the visitors back ahead just after the break. Dan James sealed victory to snap Fulham's sequence of five successive losses.
With Fulham in the ascendancy, Everton's players became increasingly disjointed and were booed off at the full-time whistle after squandering the chance to put daylight between themselves and the Premier League relegation zone. Everton remains above the bottom three on goal difference alone.
This will be especially frustrating for Everton manager Sean Dyche, whose side have a much better record at home than away. There are no such worries for his opposite number Silva, who managed Everton from May 2018 to December 2019.
Fulham remained in 10th place but has now passed the 40-point barrier and this win could reignite its hopes of pushing for Europe next season.
Crystal Palace 2, Southampton 0
In Southampton, Eberechi Eze scored twice and resurgent Crystal Palace beat last-place Southampton 2-0 for its third straight victory since the return of manager Roy Hodgson.
Eze knocked in a rebound from close range in the 54th minute and struck from distance 14 minutes later at St. Mary's Stadium in a victory that should ease any concerns Palace had about relegation.
It's a third consecutive loss for Southampton, though, and with seven matches remaining Ruben Selles' team is running out of time to find points.
The Saints have gone six straight games without a win and will travel to London to face first-place Arsenal next Friday.
Palace was without a win in 2023 when it hired the 75-year-old Hodgson last month as the replacement for the fired Patrick Vieira.
The visitors opened the scoring when Saints goalkeeper Gavin Bazunu parried Jordan Ayew's shot into the center of the box, where Eze awaited before scoring with a left-footed volley. Eze then beat two defenders and struck with his other foot on a low shot that beat Bazunu to the far post.
Carlos Alcaraz nearly cut the lead in half when his shot hit the post in the 72nd minute.
