The vivid red sunset visible before the game was perhaps not appreciated by the sparse crowd who rolled up to the Bukit Jalal Stadium by tube, car and the ubiquitous moped for the opening game of the Asia Cup in Kuala Lumpur.

Those who did make the journey to the southern suburbs of the Malaysian capital were a mixture of ex-pat brits, long-range soccerati and fanatical locals, as fixated by events in the English Premiership as their counterparts back in Blighty.

The familiar figure of Alan Shearer led out Newcastle alongside his somewhat less well-known opposite number, blues striker Geoff Horsfield, to a polite but warm greeting from the half of the stadium open for the game.

Both sides lined up in home colours but aside from the mass handshake there was an absence of ceremony, with no anthems of distinguished guests on the pitch, something which extended to the games involving the Malaysian national side.

On cue, the Birmingham contingent launched into a spirited rendition of their ditty "sh*t on the Villa" which met with applause from local fans no doubt eager to experience another facet of the English game ie obscene chanting from from Burberry-clad tattooed "characters".

Speaking of being dumped on from a great height, former mackem wrecker Howard Wilkinson was present in the crowd and his grinning visage flashed up on the big screens at either end of the stadium (watching a TV rerun of this later, the footage was hilariously accompanied by a local language soundtrack along the lines of "Howard Rilkinson....Sunran....Hahahahahahahaha!)"

A rather more palatable sight on those big screens was a promo video shown at half time from tournament co-sponsors Newcastle University and the University of Northumbria.

It may well have been the pre-match Tiger beer kicking in, but the ninety second montage of Shearer scoring, Sir Bobby smiling, the quayside and Tynemouth brought a temporary pang of homesickness. The aim of the advert is to attract Malaysian students to the North East and the ones featured in the video all seemed to be having a whale of a time playing footie on the beach and err....chatting up attractive blonde women.

Enough scene-setting and to the match. Newcastle got things underway and the first meaningful touch for Bowyer on 3 minutes took him into the City box, but he was unable to get a clear strike on goal.

The Magpie debutant was slightly closer 5 minutes later, when he shot over after an elongated series of passes and it took just 11 minutes for the unloved Robbie Savage to rediscover his tongue, unleashing a tirade of abuse at the ref who was clearly unimpressed.

With 14 minutes on the clock, Savage became the first player from either side to register a shot on target, but his effort from a Dugarry knock-down was confidently captured by Harper, making his first senior team start of 2003.

Referee Styles then yellow-carded blues defender Clemence on 18 minutes after a foul on Bowyer, and early sign that this was being treated as a bona fide competitive fixture by the match officials.

And worse was to follow in the 35th minute when Bowyer seized on a slack clearance out of defence to set Bellamy galloping in on goal. A clumsy lunge put the Welshman on the turf and while the spot kick award was justified, the straight red card brandished at Cunningham was slightly less so.

He trudged off while Savage inevitably pleaded with the official, supported by Dyer and Shearer. The latter had to time to take a glug of water whilst waiting for the ball to be retrieved before sending toon old boy Bennett the wrong way and driving the ball powerfully into the left hand side of the net.

Having snuck into the press box, your correspondent managed to retain his renowned poise and dignity while all of this was going on, in stark contrast to one or two local scribes who were enthusiastically applauding the spot kick conversion.

However, some moments earlier a wholehearted Speed challenge had elicited a hearty "gettin" that was quickly stifled and passed almost unnoticed save for the disapproving stare of a corpulent Italian correspondent.

The crowd by now had returned to their near-silent appreciation of the game, making the shouted instructions of Harper clearly audible, a soundtrack familiar to anyone who watches our reserves regularly.

Halftime saw a further blues reshuffle, while Newcastle opted to replace Robert with Viana.

No doubt after some strong rallying words from Steve Bruce, Birmingham were more alert in the early stages of the second half. However, new boy David Dunn was no more of a threat than before the interval and was mostly seen in a niggling capacity rather than the creative forward-supporting role his new employers no doubt envisaged.

United by contrast were working the ball well through midfield and taking advantage of their numerical superiority, Dyer in particular buzzing around with seemingly unlimited energy reserves.

City belatedly managed to threaten Harper's goal on the hour when Dunn crossed from the left and Speed was force to head away the danger from under his own crossbar.

Moments later Bowyer appeared to lead with his arm into a challenge and although the incident didn't flare up into anything more, the second yellow of the night was duly produced by Rob Styles.

The model of perpetual motion that was Dyer almost doubled our lead on 65 minutes, racing on to a Shearer wall pass into the right side of the City box, only the outstretched trailing foot of Purse preventing the ball reaching the unmarked Bellamy.

Back came the blues, with Harper tested twice within a minute, first blocking a Stern John (or John Stern of you believe the PA man) shot and then diving to his left to keep out another effort.

With 20 minutes remaining Sir Bobby opted to make four changes, most importantly for many local fans replacing Alan Shearer. Our goalscorer had barely removed his sweat-sodden shirt though (to oohs and aahs from a section of the crowd) before Bramble stretched to reach a ball in the box and only succeeded in "getting Carter".

Devlin dispatched the penalty into the same section of the goal as Shearer had earlier, albeit at slightly lower velocity, but still rapid enough to find the back of the net.

Within three minutes though Newcastle took the lead again, after Dyer fed Bellamy on the right hand side of the City area and his hanging cross was headed home by the lively Ameobi via an upright.

The same player then came close to extending our lead in the 77th minute after Viana for once had delivered an insightful through ball. This time though Shola's effort was deflected off a defender for a corner.

With the crowd belatedly finding their voices, the noise levels were raised again within seconds when a Harper fumble looked to have presented John with an open goal to tie the scores up again.

However he somehow contrived to place his shot wide from barely six yards out, a miss on a par with that of Dyer at Maine Road last season and acknowledged as such by the Newcastle player at the after-match press call.

With the closing stages being played by what Chris Waddle would doubtless have called "a good tempo" despite the humidity, both sides continued to give at least a fair approximation of caring about the final outcome of the game - by no means a given in games of this nature.

The Premiership virgins among the crowd also seemed to be enjoying themselves but curiously more than one or two chose to leave their seats precisely as the stadium clock clicked over on to exactly ninety minutes, even though an additional three minutes were scheduled - a case of picking up bad habits from TV perhaps?

They nearly missed a memorable final goal, as Viana blasted home a long-range effort just as the referee's whistle brought the opening match in the Asia Cup to an end.

So, a small measure of relief in black and white ranks that we hit the ground at least trotting and avoided the wooden spoon in this competition. And for the locals watching in the stadium and on TV, a reasonably authentic introduction to our club and the league competition we play in - a Shearer goal, a debatable red card, a Bowyer booking, a minimal contribution from Robert and a Bramble cock up. 

The only thing that was missing was the beer (at least in the ground) and the pies - although the pressmen were presented with some miniature efforts alongside the curries and sundry other delights laid on for them

One down then, god knows how many more to go - see you on the other side come next May. PS - it's good to be back.

Biffa

Our own view of the Asia Cup experience is online here

PS - Thanks to Michael Wood for the photo

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