Amidst all the justifiable post-match hullabaloo surrounding the goal scored against us by LuaLua, it has to be pointed out that for the preceding 88 minutes before his strike he'd given a prime illustration of why he was surplus to requirements at St.James' Park.

In a manner that's become familiar to United fans in the last three and a half years and 59 Premiership outings that have brought a goal virtually every 10 games, Lua found new ways to lose the ball, run up blind allies and vainly attempt shots from distance that we blocked and cleared.  

Had Sir Bobby restored him to our starting XI based on a display like this, then the columnists, texters and emailers would have been out in force decrying the manager for an error of judgement.

Similarly, if we cannot beat upcoming opponents Aston Villa or Wolves by the simple act of scoring more goals than Solano or Cort and their new colleagues, then there's little point in fantasising about doing anything other than falling flat on our collective posteriors in next season's Champions League - it will be as much of an irrelevance to us in 2005 as it was this year.

The thing that sticks in the collective craw of Tyneside and beyond is that this was all so easily avoidable. Like everything else this club apparently touches, we're Olympic champions when it comes to shooting ourselves in the foot. Lua didn't need to be on that pitch - to have him there was tempting fate, something that anyone who follows this madness across the globe knows only too well only ever ends in one outcome.....

Things are starting to unravel at United again and a succession of events over the last six months now seem to be snowballing together to form whatever the football equivalent of coming home to roost is. 

Whether it's results, performances, transfer policy or the public pronouncements of those concerned, more and more fans are progressively becoming disenchanted and the media are sniffing that things are far from right behind the scenes, with the effect that people in the public glare are getting twitchy.

Here's a list of ten events of varying significance to have taken place since the start of our pre-season preparations:

Bowyer acquisition
Belgrade penalty shootout failure
West Brom League Cup exit
Off-field activities and accusations concerning conduct of players
Drawing Liverpool away in the FA Cup
Sale of Solano and Cort and reaction to media / fan comments  
Woodgate injuries
Bowyer UEFA ban confusion
Vålerenga problems with pitch / team / flight
Ambrose and Dyer injuries

On their own, each of these has/had ramifications for the immediate short-term future of the club, but collectively they add up to a nagging belief that we're just luckless (especially with that bloody Anfield draw) and on a wider level, only ever a further misadventure away from becoming what the papers would just love to label once again a "club in crisis." And we're fourth.

We've got a free weekend coming up after the Vålerenga game. For an off-the- field incident to crop up or come to light next weekend would be entirely typical of our lot - another operation own goal. The media would love it, just love it. 

And much as we'd pray for it not to be true, the journalists concerned would only be reporting on the misadventures of our club and its occupants - sure, they'd do it with some relish, putting a spin on it to try and court controversy, but in the final analysis the raw materials would be home produced.    

We've been here before of course, when a decision motivated by financial considerations saw Les Ferdinand agree to join Spurs just hours before Alan Shearer crippled himself at Goodison Park. 

That single decision still looks to be our "Archduke Ferdinand" moment, when the course of history was altered by one action. 

The 2004 remix of this same old song and dance has us peddling a Peruvian for a pittance, whilst simultaneously trumpeting the abundance of choices we have in that position. You just knew then what was coming next - the custard pie in the face, the upturned rake, the banana skin. 

It might not have happened within the same rapid time frame, but we now find ourselves not only without the injured Dyer and Ambrose but also Bowyer and Kerr due to some UEFA registration wrangle that nobody will own up to. Unfortunate? Certainly. Self-inflicted? Definitely.

(The whereabouts of Jamie McClen still remains a mystery, although he haven't checked the Blyth Spartans teamsheet for a few weeks...)

In fact, the only other current players to have occupied this position are our new rebuilt and reconditioned goalscoring saviour Craig Bellamy......and Lomana LuaLua. Now there's a thing. 

We should be able to beat the Norwegians with whatever team we field - remember, this is the best squad Sir Bobby has ever assembled...but that theory didn't quite work in Oslo did it?

Perhaps we'll maintain our long-established tradition of bringing a player in to play him out of position - maybe Michael Bridges can then come on and attempt to resurrect his playing career in right midfield like he did here at Fratton Park - that's if he isn't in the queue to fill in for the suspended Bernard at left back ahead of Robbie Elliott of course...

To go back to the revitalised Taff Flyer for a second, were it not for his goal-a-game ratio since returning, we'd be in a similar funk to Fulham and Charlton, with a hole in their side where someone talented used to reside. It's great that he's showing form, but again just typical of NUFC that the other star performers in his absence have dipped out of the spotlight since his goals have come back on stream.

And as for the continuing injury sagas of Dyer and Woodgate, the only person who despairs more than Sir Bobby must be Sven, who believes that both are vital to his cause - elements of Captain Lager aka Bryan Robson and World Cup 1990 there, surely?

Returning to events at Fratton Park, this wouldn't have been a great victory had we achieved it, but in the desperate scramble to raise our head above the parapet and glimpse the front three's flapping shirt tails, PLCs can't be choosers.

That we failed again to finish a team off is galling in the extreme - that we conceded a goal in the latter stages is frustrating. But it's almost as if we're fated to f**k up - for over a century we've been finding new ways to meddle with the emotions of supporters, building up their hopes time and time again to demolish them before blaming people for caring. Make your crowd indifferent to you and you really are knackered.

It's starting to become apparent that our much-respected septuagenarian no longer has anything to say that can lift this squad of players. We might play well in flashes, but when was the last time we managed to string two consecutive halves of decent play together?  

The evidence was on the pitch at Fratton Park, at Ewood Park, at St.Andrews and in Olso. The evidence at St.James' Park is in the miserable atmosphere that routinely pervades the stands - we might have been called muppets and budgerigars this season - but at least you can normally get a tune out of the latter, unlike thousands of folk slumped in their seats and wondering why they bothered with season tickets.

Blame society, blame television, but don't forget to blame the people who put the "product" on the pitch and those who are tasked to convey entertainment to the masses for grand reward.

Times change. The big investment, the big stands, the big headlines, the big fat nothing in the trophy cupboard of any description whatsoever. The club created this monster, gave it seats and appropriated a name for it (Toon Army) but never fed it with real success.  Now belatedly it's starting to snap and bite.

Remember how our fans danced around the toon (and smashed up Bigg Market netties) less than a decade ago, heady with delight at having secured a place in the UEFA Cup? Now as much a part of history as terraces and the twin towers - £40 for a seat at Spurs tends to focus the mind, as does seeing people from Teesside wearing T-shirts with "winners" written on it.

One can never accuse Shepherd of not going out and securing then backing bosses with previously-successful track records or profiles. But Robson looks like joining Charlton, Ardiles, Keegan, Dalglish and Gullit in biting off more than they can chew at this club. 

The situation is starting to echo the fall of the Dutchman. We might not be in a perilous league position, but there are factions within the club and an apparent air of mutual mistrust between players, fans, manager and chairman.

Unlike Liverpool, people aren't appearing in the stands with banners demanding titles or jamming radio stations to vent their spleen, but slowly the ground is shifting and attitudes are changing as people see the evidence of their own eyes - there's something lacking that was there in De Kuip and the San Siro and we seem unable to raise ourselves collectively from our apathy - and that's fans as well as players.

I don't recall anyone chanting for the removal of our Dutch manager - but he still went when the pressure was cranked up. And when your current incumbent is slagging off a newspaper for publishing a photo of him yawning and suggesting journalists are being disloyal to the cause for trying to be objective, then it's a reasonable contention that he's feeling the pressure.

Regardless of what happens in the UEFA Cup, regardless of where we finish in the league, the chances of us welcoming a new manager next season have increased significantly in the last week - a week in which we held on to fourth place and remained unbeaten for an eighth successive league game in 2004. Most of the rest of the league would dream of stepping into our shoes - the likes of Souness and Bruce (or Allardyce and McLaren) would sell their bairns to be where we are, but.....

It's madness, it's football, it's Newcastle United.

On the face of it, even speaking like this about a side with one league loss from the last fifteen games is verging on the heretical. But the evidence is there on the field.

Grand old man of football he may be, doyen of the talk-in and renowned source of reminiscences concerning the glory days of the game, but people are starting to shuffle behind his chair, making exasperated noises and rolling their eyes. 

Meanwhile, players forty and fifty years his junior conspire to ruin his dream - and he seems unwilling or unable to acknowledge that fact, or more importantly do anything about it.

For his sake (and mine) I'd love to see him walk away with the UEFA Cup complete with black and white ribbons tucked under his arm, but I grow more and more convinced that he'll bid farewell to us this May with nothing more than platitudes ringing in his ears and thoughts of regret about what could have been, but wasn't. 

A bit like that night fourteen years ago in Turin, when Waddle blazed his penalty over, the hope and optimism just melted away leaving behind sympathy and applause, but nothing more tangible.

PS - There's a reason why you don't get medals for finishing fourth in the league - because it counts for absolutely bugger all....unless you're an accountant.  

Biffa