In May of 2009, Monday 11th May to be precise, in our third last game of the season – Newcastle had a monumental win, when we beat Middlesbrough 3-1 at St. James’ Park in front of a sell-out crowd, after going a goal down after only three minutes.
Alan Shearer – couldn’t save us four years ago
But Newcastle came storming back with a goal six minutes later when Steven Taylor brilliantly headed the ball home, and further goals in the second half from Oba Martins and Peter Lovenkrands gave us the 3 points.
We had started the game 3 points behind Hull in 3rd bottom place and level on 31 points with Middlesbrough, so at the end of the game we were 4th bottom, and it was the win that had saved us, or so we all thought.
With two games to go Newcastle were on 34 points, and 4th bottom above Hill City on goal difference – -17 compared to Hull’s -24.
Newcastle would play Fulham at home on the Saturday and then Aston Villa away in the last game.,
But Newcastle lost to Fulham 1-0, it was only Fulham’s 3rd away win of the season, and Hull got a 1-1 draw at Bolton, after losing their previous five league games, and they moved one point above Newcastle – unbelievable.
And then of course we went down at Villa Park 1-0 with an own goal from Damien Duff, and took the drop from the Premier League for the first time ever.
Newcastle are a bit better off this time with two games to play, being 3 points above Wigan and the goal difference of the two teams is exactly the same at -23.
But it’s a cautionary tale from four years ago, that we’re still not safe, and Newcastle need 4 points to be technically sure of staying up – independent of what the other sides do in their final two games.
In that sense it’s still all to play for on Sunday at QPR, and we should take nothing for granted.
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18 comments so far
Indian Magpie (HD_07 on Twitter)
May 8, 2013 at 10:10 AM
Comment #1Ed You are delusional
It was Fulham. That donkey WEBB disallowed a perfectly good goal from viduka and send bassong off
Indian Magpie (HD_07 on Twitter)
May 8, 2013 at 10:11 AM
Comment #2Poor bolton were tired after beating us so could only draw with hull.
Indian Magpie (HD_07 on Twitter)
May 8, 2013 at 10:11 AM
Comment #3Any 1 thinks if pardew is sacked or he does a fergie, he will ever find a job again?
Ben3arfa
May 8, 2013 at 10:11 AM
Comment #4We played Fulham at home and lost 1-0, not Bolton 🙂
Ben3arfa
May 8, 2013 at 10:13 AM
Comment #5those were depressing times
catchy in norway
May 8, 2013 at 10:16 AM
Comment #6these are depressing times
but im happy fergy is quiting
maybe,, he wants one last chalenge,,
come and save us,, this we club in the north
yo-yo
May 8, 2013 at 10:17 AM
Comment #7If QPR beat us – which is still on the cards as we travel badly – then we are still in the mire unless Wigan lose again. They have nothing to lose by going for it at Gooners.
The best solution to all our problems is for AP to go to Old Trafford.
Mashley gets his release money and might afford a manager outside the bargain basement he shops in, and AP will level the playing field in the EPL for the rest of the clubs.
Mr Ashley can we please have more than one goal scoring forward ?
GenralHez
May 8, 2013 at 10:19 AM
Comment #8I still believe we will survive and Wigan will go down, no thanks to Pardew.
Next season we need a manager who plays the players in their best positions and tries to win games. Pardew is probably responsible for more stress and heart attacks on Tyneside than all the cigarettes and kebabs put together.
catchy in norway
May 8, 2013 at 10:22 AM
Comment #9please
AP
this is the chalenge your life has been waiting for,,
you are way to good for us
davis_toons
May 8, 2013 at 10:25 AM
Comment #10Reply to Indian.
Winning genuinely and consistently, thats the way forward.
Thats is the only way we can improve. Pardew got to get it.
Playing every match with 1 or 2 lucky break or profit from others mistake will not make us improve overall. We will come back to this again.
Our winning will stops when opposing side can create, did not make mistakes and no lucky break/ goals for us.
We have to win teams by creating chances on chances for every game to justified improvement. Team and Pardew have to do that.
With that improvement, i will support Alan Pardew.
Just hope that MA or Llambias will not give more problems anymore and let Pardew do his job. Then we can surly rate him.
Timeline : 2nd half of next Season.
fray bentos
May 8, 2013 at 10:28 AM
Comment #11@Dagga
GREAT POST!!
Nice to read amongst the sea of hysterical and idiotic outbursts dominating the blog at the moment, just came back on here over last few days and have noticed many of the balanced and thoughful posters are not posting, guessing they got really sick of it all
catchy in norway
May 8, 2013 at 10:29 AM
Comment #12davis_toons
can i ask
why you have faith in pardew to diliver,,
when his history tells you he never does
catchy in norway
May 8, 2013 at 10:35 AM
Comment #13frey
by ballanced do you mean biaced
you carnt say ballanced when the bad facts out weigh the good ones
Indian Magpie (HD_07 on Twitter)
May 8, 2013 at 10:36 AM
Comment #14Catchy
Forget them, when they have another season under pardew of mediocrity and excuses they will realise how poor this guy really is.
Bet they think Souness abnd Dalglish were excellent too
Dagga
May 8, 2013 at 10:56 AM
Comment #15I have never rated Souness as a manager. Dalglish at his time of appouintment to Newcastle I probably thought he was decent, however, I thought it was an idiotic appointment by the board. Keegan had a squad tailored to his attacking style and we went and appointed a defensive coach and guess what – he went and did exactly what I thought he would do and dismantle the squad.
I am on the fence with Pardew, he has had one good season and one bad one. He clearly has good man management skills, he got a squad upset at the Houghton sacking on board quicklyand has gone along way to tame the wild ways of Ben Arfa.
Rotonda heights
May 8, 2013 at 11:15 AM
Comment #16Fray
We are 17th,
playing the worst anti football I’ve ever seen and
we have the most incompetnt manger I’ve ever known.
HAPPY DAYS – NOT!!
People like you just twiddle their thumbs while the ship goes down and accept wolesale spineless mediocrity.
Why aren’t you mad as hell? Do you have any passion
at all or is this football malarkey not really your bag?
south coast toon
May 8, 2013 at 11:22 AM
Comment #17my god thankfully wigan lost, but it is poor when you watch us play with the players we have, how badly they play,pardew inherited a good bunch when he came in and it seems he has trouble getting the newer players to play to there strenghs. simpson looks alot stronger in defence and i feel sorry for him as he does his job well,how do we go from having one of the best defences in the league for 5 months to the shambles this season, how does one of the best midfield pairings last season cabs and tiote go to what we have seen this season,
how does cisse go from everything in the net to everything not
how do we have so many injuries
why do we close shop at 1-0….
why is there no fight in the team
we can all see it why can no-one else…
we still need results to go our way, we could win at qpr, but wigan are more likely to beat arsenal, and i cant see us beating arsenal, so either way if we stay up we have been very lucky if we go we deserved it, whats important is that the issues are dealt with,and if ashley feels pards cant do it he best start chasing benetez, moyes or a footballing manager, im not a neger its there to see we will be lucky to stay up lets hope ashley has learnt another lesson from another mistake
these problems have been there all season and we can all see it
AmericanGeordie
May 8, 2013 at 2:53 PM
Comment #18In my estimation these are our quickest/easiest paths to guaranteed safety:
1. Win @ QPR, Villa loses to Chelsea on Saturday.
2. Draw @ QPR, Wigan loses @ Arsenal on Tuesday.
3. Take 4 points from our remaining 6.
Obviously, I’ll be rooting hard for the first one, so this will all be done and dusted on Sunday, and I can get on with my life and stop worrying about it!