Leicester come from behind to beat ill-disciplined Newcastle at Welford Road

Peter Betham scored at the beginning of the second half to hand his side the lead

Leicester moved up to third in the Aviva Premiership standings after a 22-10 victory over Newcastle at Welford Road.

Tries from Telusa Veainu, Peter Betham and No 8 Laurence Pearce handed the Tigers the win over the Falcons after they had started the game by conceding early points to the visitors.

An early try from Nili Latu took the Falcons into a 10-0 lead, but when Belisario Agulla and Mark Wilson were each shown yellow cards within the space of a minute, Leicester muscled their way back into the game.

The defeat sees the Falcons drop to the bottom of the table after London Irish claimed a surprise victory over Northampton at the Madejski Stadium.

The Tigers got off to a poor start when Fraser Balmain was sin-binned for a dangerous tackle in the fifth minute, and Craig Willis called for the kicking tee to make it 3-0 to Newcastle.

The Falcons continued to apply pressure on the Tigers, before a lineout in the opposition 22 led to Latu scoring on the back of a catch and drive. Willis converted the try to make it 10-0 to the visitors as the first quarter drew to a close.

The home side responded through a Freddie Burns penalty to cut the deficit to seven points, before Newcastle lost Agulla to the sin-bin for a tip-tackle, and Wilson joined him moments later for failing to release.

Leicester wasted no time putting the extra men to good use, as Veainu went over in the corner after finding space out wide and Burns added the conversion to draw the sides level.

The Tigers thought they had added another try minutes later as Mathew Tait went over the try-line, but replays showed he had dropped the ball and it remained 10-10 going into the break.

The home side continued their fightback two minutes into the second half as Betham broke a tackle to go over in the corner, with Burns once again adding the conversion to put the Tigers into the lead for the first time in the match.

But despite being in control, and opting to kick for the corner time and again, Leicester could only manage one more score through Pearce, with the bonus point eluding Richard Cockerill's men.