Dwight Gayle hit a hat-trick as Newcastle scored twice in second-half stoppage time to beat Norwich 4-3 in an epic Sky Bet Championship encounter at St James' Park.

Rafael Benitez's side were behind heading into the closing stages on Wednesday night, but Yoan Gouffran levelled with a header in the fifth of six added minutes before Gayle notched his third of the night with virtually the final kick of the game.

Norwich would have returned to the top of the table if Alex Neil's side had secured victory, and they had a 3-1 lead with 20 minutes to go after recovering from falling behind to an early Gayle goal.

But Gayle pulled Newcastle back into the game in the 71st minute, before Newcastle's late, late show sent the home fans wild and lifted the club up to third in the table.

Image: Newcastle's Jonjo Shelvey and Norwich City's Alex Tettey battle for the ball

Newcastle dominated the early stages and could have been a few ahead before they took the lead. Gayle had a trio of opportunities to put the home side in front within a matter of minutes, but a mixture of poor finishing and good goalkeeping from Michael McGovern initially kept the striker at bay.

Matt Ritchie then hit the crossbar with a thunderous header after 21 minutes, before he turned creator to set up the opener for Gayle just three minutes later.

The former Bournemouth winger's low ball in from the right found the striker in the area, and he made no mistake in tucking it home from close range to give Newcastle a deserved lead.

Falling behind seemed to wake Norwich up a little, but in truth they didn't really look at all like scoring until they were gifted a penalty on the stroke of half-time.

Gouffran clumsily bundled Robbie Brady to the floor, and Karl Darlow - in goal for Newcastle to replace the dropped Matz Sels - could do very little about Graham Dorrans' penalty low into the bottom right corner.

Image: Newcastle's Gayle celebrates with Aleksandar Mitrovic after scoring the late winner

Norwich came out after the break in sharper mood and they found the lead within seven minutes of the restart thanks to a stunning finish from Cameron Jerome.

The striker picked the ball up just inside the area, before turning inside and leaving St James' Park stunned by bending an absolute beauty into the top corner past Darlow.

And not too long afterwards it looked as though Norwich would be claiming all three points as Jacob Murphy's long-range strike took a hefty deflection before flying into the net.

Despite the setback, Newcastle fought back right away and they pulled one back just two minutes later as Gayle fired past McGovern for his second of the evening.

Benitez then ushered his men forward as they pushed for an equaliser, but it looked as though Norwich would hold on. At least until the board went up late on to show six added minutes.

Eventually the pressure told on Norwich, as Gouffran headed home, maybe via a slight touch off a Norwich man, before Gayle instinctively fired past McGovern from the edge of the area to cap off a stunning end to the match.



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