Martins secures Toon victory

The striker opened the scoring on 60 minutes and sealed the three points for the north-east side with his second goal seven minutes from time.

The result lifted Newcastle up six places to 14th in the table, while Villa missed the chance to go third.

Gabriel Agbonlahor and Ashley Young missed golden chances to give Villa the lead in the first half, but Newcastle came out firing after the break.

Martins made the first goal all on his own, turning the defender and firing a low shot into the bottom corner.

And after Jonas Gutierrez was allowed to run in from the left and run the ball across goal, Martins enjoyed an easy finish to seal victory for Joe Kinnear's side.

"I think we spoke to ourselves that we really needed this match," Martins said.

"We needed to try 100 percent to win. I hope we continue like this.

"I think it's very important for strikers to score goals and I am very happy to score two goals, but I have to thank my teammates as well."