Stay up to date with notifications from The Independent

Notifications can be managed in browser preferences.

Bassong urges fans to keep the faith after missed opportunity

Newcastle defender looks to Anfield after home draw keeps them in bottom three

Damian Spellman
Wednesday 29 April 2009 00:00 BST
Comments

The Newcastle defender Sébastien Bassong has promised the club will not give up hope of escaping relegation after passing up a golden opportunity to ease their plight.

The Magpies went into Monday night's home fixture with Portsmouth believing a win and further victories at home to Middlesbrough and Fulham could secure their top-flight status. However, 90 frustrating minutes later they trudged off after a 0-0 draw, having allowed chances to go begging but also seeing Pompey miss their own opportunities and be denied a penalty.

Newcastle now face a trip to Liverpool on Sunday, where few would give them any chance of returning with a positive result after their 5-1 drubbing by the Reds on Tyneside in December.

But Bassong for one is refusing to throw in the towel. "We are disappointed because we needed a win," he said yesterday. "Everyone knows the situation and if we don't win our home games then it will be really hard to stay up. Now we have drawn, so it will be harder. But we believe, and we will keep playing.

"I can understand that the fans are very worried. The situation is not the best. I can just say to them to stay behind us, because we need them. Without them, we will have already lost, so if they stay behind us we will try to give the maximum to stay up. It will be easier with them."

A crowd of 47,481 responded to the new manager Alan Shearer's pre-match plea to raise the roof, and the players could not be faulted for their effort or commitment on a night when there was so much at stake.

But the sad fact is that the Frankenstein's monster of a team Shearer has inherited from his predecessors over the last two years was simply not good enough to beat fellow strugglers Portsmouth. The manager threw everything he had at the visitors, starting with Michael Owen, Mark Viduka and Obafemi Martins in attack and introducing Andy Carroll and Jonas Gutierrez in a late effort to snatch victory, but to no avail.

Having lost their only specialist left-back, Jose Enrique, to a hamstring injury, which seems certain to rule him out of the trip to Liverpool at least, within minutes of his return from a knee problem, the Magpies created a series of chances either side of half-time, but could not take any of them.

Damien Duff forced a good save from David James, and Martins and Viduka respectively headed and shot over the bar, while Viduka stabbed another effort straight at the goalkeeper just after the restart. However, it was to Owen that the best chance of the game fell with 63 minutes gone. But, having been presented with the opportunity to score his first goal since January, he fired straight at James.

Shearer's frustration was there for all to see as his fourth game in charge yielded just a second point. Newcastle remain three points from safety and need a rousing finish to the season to overhaul either Hull or Sunderland and fend off West Bromwich and Middlesbrough below them.

Shearer was putting on a brave face as he started preparations for the Liverpool game. The 38-year-old said: "Everybody will write us off for Liverpool, but we will go there prepared and see what happens. They are going for the title and they are under pressure too. I saw them at Hull [on Saturday]. They didn't play particularly well, but won the game. We will not give up."

Enrique was due to have a scan on his hamstring, but Shearer was not holding out much hope, while he revealed after the Portsmouth game that Gutierrez had not started because of an ankle problem which is still being monitored.

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in