Four goals in the first half from Anthony Gordon helped Newcastle to a comfortable 6-1 Champions League victory in Baku. Re-live the best facts and Opta data in our Qarabag vs Newcastle stats page.
Newcastle United have all-but qualified for the last 16 of the UEFA Champions League after a 6-1 demolition of Azerbaijan side Qarabag in the first leg of the knockout play-off round.
Anthony Gordon struck four in a devastating first-half display that saw Newcastle go into half-time leading 5-0. Malick Thiaw had added another before half-time, while substitute Jacob Murphy completed the scoring in the second half. Eddie Howe’s team now have one foot (and about four toes) in the round of 16 where one of Chelsea or Barcelona await.
The 2,529-mile trip to Baku was the longest ever journey made by an English side for a Champions League away match, but it did nothing to slow down the visitors, who produced a devastating first-half display.
They needed just two minutes to take the lead, Gordon firing them ahead after a marauding carry from Dan Burn, who stepped out of defence and slipped a perfectly weighted throughball into his path.
Gordon finished coolly for his seventh goal of the campaign. He would go on to add three more, but this first strike took him past Alan Shearer (6) for the most Champions League goals scored by a Newcastle player.
The second quickly followed. From the second phase of a corner, Kieran Trippier whipped in an inviting cross and Thiaw rose high to head back across goal and in.
Wave after wave of attacks followed, and the game looked every bit like a top-10 side in the Opta Power Rankings facing the lowest-ranked team left in the competition.
Harvey Barnes – who somehow did not score tonight despite attempting a joint-high six shots – played a decisive role in the third goal. His effort from a cleverly-worked corner struck the arm of Matheus Silva inside the box, and Gordon converted the penalty to make it three.
The unravelling continued. Gordon soon completed his hat-trick after he robbed Kevin Medina in possession, rounded the goalkeeper and tapped into an empty net for the fourth.
There was still time for more before the break, as Gordon added a second penalty — his fourth goal and Newcastle’s fifth. They became the first team to lead by five goals at half-time of a Champions League knockout away match, while Gordon is only the second player in Champions League history to score four goals in the first half of a game, after Luiz Adriano did so for Shakhtar Donetsk against BATE Borisov in October 2014.
By half-time, Newcastle had generated 4.5 expected goals – the highest first-half total on record in a Champions League match. Defensively they became just the fourth team in the competition this season not to face a single shot in the opening 45 minutes.
It took Qarabag 55 minutes to register a shot on goal, and they scored from it, as Elvin Cafarquliyev pulled one back for the hosts. But substitute Murphy restored Newcastle’s five-goal advantage, cutting in from the right and curling a deflected left-footed strike into the top corner.
Across 90 minutes, the Magpies generated 5.4 expected goals, a total only bettered this season by Liverpool (5.9) in their Champions League encounter with … Qarabag. This one of the most comprehensive and one-sided performances of the 2025-26 campaign.
Our Opta match centre delivers you all the Qarabag vs Newcastle stats from their Champions League meeting in Azerbaijan on Wednesday.
The match centre below includes team and player stats, expected goals data, passing networks, an Opta chalkboard and more. It gives you everything you need to do your own match analysis.
Underneath the match centre you can find the official Opta stats on the game as well.
Qarabag vs Newcastle Post-Match Facts
Newcastle’s victory is the 92nd time that a team have won by 5+ goals in the first leg of a two-legged knockout stage tie in the European Cup/UEFA Champions League – each of the previous 91 went on to progress. Newcastle’s 6-1 win is their biggest margin of victory in the UEFA Champions League, while the Magpies were only the second side ever to lead a Champions League knockout stage game by 5+ goals at half-time, after Bayern Munich in the quarter-finals v FC Porto in April 2015 (also 5-0). Newcastle United were the first side to start as many as seven English players for a UEFA Champions League knockout tie since Manchester United against Monaco in the 1997-98 quarter-finals (7 in both legs). Anthony Gordon is now Newcastle’s top scorer in the UEFA Champions League (10), with his four goals seeing him overtake Alan Shearer (6). He is just the second Englishman to reach double figures for goals in a single Champions League campaign, after Harry Kane in 2024-25 (11).Subscribe to our football newsletter to receive exclusive weekly content. You should also follow our social accounts over on X, Instagram, TikTok and Facebook.
Qarabag 1-6 Newcastle Stats: First-Half Rout Sees Magpies Cruise To Victory Opta Analyst.
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