Full time: Charlton  0  Newcastle 0

Sir Bobby commented:

"It was nip and tuck. They were a hard-working team. They have had a poorish run so they were determined.

"On our side we made some changes, but defensively we played very well. Neither side created any clear chances and defences were on top. Overall any point you get in The Premiership away from home is a valuable point. 

We have also kept Charlton from going above us. What we now have to do is concentrate on our home form and win them. Overall I think it was a fair point, as we didn't deserve to win and neither did Charlton. 

Nobby is an attacking player but I thought he would give us a bit of poise and he did that. I thought he had a superb game.

"Shay is fantastic, no question about that. He is on a good contract and is an important member of our defensive rearguard. He is a fine keeper and made one or two fantastic saves which ended any hopes Charlton had of winning."


Meanwhile Alan Shearer had some stark words about our current position:

"We need to improve and start climbing the table. We need fourth place because Arsenal, Manchester United and Chelsea have got the top three spots sewn up," Shearer said Sunday. We won't win the league, it doesn't take a genius to work that out,

"Apart from Blackburn, no-one has been able to break Manchester United and Arsenal's stranglehold on the Premiership,' said Shearer, who played a pivotal role in Rovers' 1995 championship success.

"I thought Newcastle were in touching distance, which is one of the reasons I joined the club. It didn't turn out that way - we finished second in the league twice and got to two FA Cup finals.

"But you might as well not bother if you are going to finish second. We are part of a mini-league competing for fourth place. Ourselves, Liverpool, Charlton, Fulham and Southampton are all involved.

“It is going to be tough but we must make sure we get there because we let ourselves down when we got knocked out of the Champions League earlier in the season.”

They Said

Alan Curbishley said:

"We had some decent chances. I'm disappointed we didn't get the three points. I don't think it was a boring 0-0. 

We needed to score and had some good chances. Shay Given made a great save - perhaps it was a bad miss! We will settle for the point. 

I think we were dominated for 20 minutes then we got back in it and put some decent balls in.

"Shay Given managed to get a hand on one or two of the real scary ones. I'm delighted that we held a side as good as Newcastle. Had we lost a goal early on it would have been the same old trend."

"Jon Fortune doesn't really ever let us down. He seems to have a run of 10 games then suddenly comes out. I say to him he's not aggressive. He could be stronger and sharper, but for the last two games he's done really well. He's now got to keep it going."

Shay Given made his 250th senior appearance in all competitions for the club (249 starts + 1 sub v Birmingham City LC in October 1999 after Steve Harper was dismissed). He becomes only the fourth NUFC 'keeper to reach that total:

Jimmy Lawrence 496
Willie McFaul 387
Ronnie Simpson 295
Shay Given 250

Alan Shearer's 700th game - that includes all league and cup games for Southampton, Blackburn, Newcastle and England (full, U21 & U17). Charity Shield not included. Unfortunately he was unable to find the next for a 6th consecutive Premiership game, only equalling his record of 5 goalscoring appearances in succession for the 4th time.

Our second 0-0 of the season after the scoreless Bolton home game. We avoided any in the league last season and our last away one was at Leicester's Filbert Street in January 2002.

This season / last season at the same point (17 games played):

2002/03: 6th with 29 points. won 9, drawn 2, lost 6. Scored 27 conceded 24.

2003/04: 6th with 25 points. Won 6, drawn 7, lost 4. Scored 25 conceded 20.

Once again we managed to avoid a defeat in the Premiership and once again we played reasonably well at times in the game. However, there was again frustration that we couldn't quite raise our game to slip past another also-ran side (like us) and were consequently forced to settle for sharing a point each, with that vital third one disappearing forever into the ether.

The stats above tell the story - one year on, our much-maligned defence has helped us in turning defeats into draws on days like this when once we would have crumbled to a late penalty or unforced error. However, just as often we've not been able to either hold a lead or crucially to complete a comeback from being behind by grabbing the three points.

That being the case, we continue to swim in the same pool as half a dozen other clubs, who are all either deficient at the front or back and consequently unable to climb away towards the big three, who continue to stride forward out of sight.

Entertaining though this was, it had an air of a pleasant diversion - an unthreatening sideshow to occupy 30 seconds of the Premiership's airtime. The real action was going on somewhere else and we weren't involved in proceedings - something we're going to have to do something about or get used to - make no mistake we need a UEFA Cup run to breathe life into this season, especially in view of the bye Southampton were given in the FA Cup (we write that in desperation, hoping to invoke some mysterious force into helping us out down there....)

A week before we'd quite literally been scoring goals for fun, but whatever had been in the water last week had been washed away by the pre-match rain that necessitated a 12.30pm pitch inspection at the Valley. We started brightly enough with energy, purpose and adventure - aided by a willingness from Charlton to concede ground in the face of our forward movements.

But the goals didn't come and our crosses went wide, shots were mis-hit in the main or when struck truly, rebounded off a home defender. 

Before the game we'd been slightly concerned that Solano could be exposed at right back in the face of the sly Di Canio, but in the event the Peruvian had the better of his tussles with the Italian, who soon resorted to his music hall act when the referee and his team mates showed no interest in his histrionics and hand-waving.

But if Solano was the pick of the outfield players on a day when few showed anything genuinely memorable, then it was Shay Given who saved us on a number of occasions with an almost Schmeichel-like "they shall not pass" display, when his sheer presence in the Newcastle goal seemed to dissuade home players from beating him.

With Shearer well-shackled and failing to conjure up any genuine goalscoring opportunities, some of the responsibility should have fallen on the broad shoulders of Shola. Unfortunately he failed to get to grips with the home defence in the main, only occasionally managing to use his body strength and stay on his feet long enough to create problems. A smack in the face didn't help matters and his replacement LuaLua never found any room to work in - at this point it's worth pointing out that after three years of hoping against hoping and defending him we've bowed to the inevitable - yes, he's a circus act and not a Premiership player. 

Robert was busy without being inspired, while Dyer kept himself fit with an afternoon of shuttle-running that looked nice but didn't really damage the home side. At least he had a spring in his (ineffective) step though, unlike the under-whelming Jenas who again seemed lethargic and a shadow of his former self.

Presumably it was too dark/wet/near Xmas for Viana to entertain us with his own unique brand of magic, while the late appearance of Ambrose almost brought him a first Premiership goal on his seventh league start from the bench.

That would have been tough on Charlton though - not that we'd have been bothered unduly. Quite simply we didn't have enough in our locker, armoury, tank, wherever, to beat this lot. The story of our season.

Biffa   

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