Blue murder

If a week is a long time in politics, a few days is an aeon in the life of a Newcastle United supporter.

As recently as Thursday night we were celebrating an excellent 3-2 victory against Swiss outfit FC Basel in the first (away) leg of our UEFA Cup tie. Having been 1-0 and then 2-1 down, we showed real guts and determination to claw our way back against a side who, let’s not forget, were (alongside ourselves) the other surprise package of last season’s Champions’ League, progressing unexpectedly to the second group stage with some very impressive performances. Robert scored again, Bramble doubled his tally for the club and Ameobi grabbed the second half winner to swing the tie in our favour in advance of the home leg in three weeks’ time. All very pleasing.

And then in our very next match we turn in the most spiritless, gutless, spineless performance against Chelsea, a side ruthless enough to make us pay for it in spades. The 5-0 scoreline did not flatter our hosts – they were awesome, we were abysmal. Perhaps the writing was on the wall before the game even kicked off. Last season, in the days before Abramovich’s millions improved the side immeasurably, we lost the corresponding fixture 3-0. Chelsea fielded the same side that had so comprehensively destroyed Lazio on their own turf on Tuesday, while our one truly inspirational on-field talisman Shearer was ruled out shortly before kick-off with the flu, and (arguably) our other three best outfield players – Woodgate, Dyer and Bellamy – were all already sidelined with injury. Worse still, Sir Bobby had just been "named" (read "cursed") as Manager of the Month for October...

Once the game was underway, our cause wasn’t exactly helped by the awful decision to dismiss Andy O’Brien and award a penalty when Adrian Mutu waited until he got into the box to take a dive. The penalty tucked away by Lampard, the score was 3-0, we were down to ten men, and we were facing up to the fact that we had more than half the game left.

But neither the injury list, nor the strength of the opposition, nor an appalling refereeing decision can excuse the nature of the display. Aside perhaps from Aaron Hughes, no-one in a black and white shirt emerged from the match with a scrap of credit. We were outplayed, outclassed and outfought in every department, all over the pitch – simply not good enough. A match to forget in a hurry. Hopefully it’ll be the last time this season that we play so poorly.

It’ll also be the last time I ever say, with the score at 1-0: “Well, a 1-0 defeat wouldn’t be such a bad result given the circumstances”. With hindsight, it was of course inevitable that both the circumstances and the scoreline were about to take a dramatic turn for the worse…