'Something you'd see on a park on a Sunday' - Steve Bruce bemoans Newcastle United defending and VAR after Leeds United defeat

The Whites scored three goals in the final 13 minutes to win 5-2, Stuart Dallas' header forcing Newcastle to go chasing the game, which in turn allowed Leeds to hit them on the counter attack through Gjanni Alioski and Jack Harrison.

Bruce felt the scoreline did not reflect the majority of the Elland Road encounter. The visitors led through Jeff Hendrick in the first half but were 2-1 down by the half hour mark, Patrick Bamford and Rodrigo finding the net. Ciaran Clark levelled with a header from a corner but Leeds remained in control and eventually cruised to victory.

"Up until the last 12 minutes or whatever it was I thought we gave as good as we got and it could go our way," said Bruce.

"Unfortunately we've been punished and given away bad goals. When you give away bad goals at this level, in two or three minutes, it's hard to swallow."

His team's defending was the chief source of Bruce's post-game woe.

"I'll leave it to others to judge but up until 75 minutes I was comfortable. Leeds are always going to ask you questions with the way they play, they do it very well but we've gifted them goals, something you'd see on a park on a Sunday and it's unacceptable," he said.

"I'm not going to make [the club's recent Covid-19 outbreak] an excuse. We made sure we were fresh enough, we've simply given two, three poor goals away. It's hard to analyse it. Leeds caused us problems all evening but we showed a certain resistance against it and looked a threat the other way. We've not defended well enough and got punished.

"We've chased the game and got caught, you can't do that. The last 10 minutes masks what the rest of the game was. Yes we were up against it at times but we continued to carry a threat.

"We have to make ourselves better defensively. The third goal in particular when we've given the ball away cheaply in our own box. We have to defend better than what we did today."

Bruce was also disappointed with the lack of action taken over a Liam Cooper challenge in the Leeds area, Callum Wilson going down under attention from the Leeds captain.

The incident took place with the score at 2-2 and Bruce was left wondering what might have been, had VAR intervened.

"I honestly was all for VAR when they brought it in to make sure the clear and obvious mistakes the ref misses, that's what it's there for," he said.

"If anyone looks at the challenge it's a clear penalty. We might not have gone on to win but when you go up in the Premier League and take the lead the outcome could have been very different."