Sir Bobby urges Robert to stay on brighter side

These are disorientating times for the Magpies. On the pitch at St James' Park on Thursday night, Sir Bobby Robson's boys didn't know whether they were coming out of Europe or going to the brink of the Uefa Cup quarter-finals, getting embarrassingly outclassed by Real Mallorca for the best part of an hour yet ending up 4-1 winners. Off the pitch, their followers are having similar problems, as experienced by one Anthony Crozier, who bought five return flights to Malaga in the expectation of seeing the second leg there.

His mates will presumably be making sure he knows his Eindhoven from his Edinburgh and his Auxerre from his Aberdeen, because, for all they were in a flap on Thursday, the Magpies are getting ready to spread their wings again with a tie in the last eight against the Dutch or the French. Barring a balls-up in the Balearics, Newcastle are going places on the European front. On the domestic front, though, they still have a little travel sickness to cure.

As against Mallorca, Newcastle's record at home and away in the Premiership has been as black and white as their shirts. Since the turn of the year, they have won all four of the League games they have contested at St James' Park. On the road, they have not won since a 3-2 success against Fulham at Loftus Road in October. They have drawn eight in a row.

"It's vital that we start winning away from home in the Premiership," their Gallic left-back Olivier Bernard said. "We've seen in the table that if you just draw all the time then the other teams catch you up. We have given Liverpool a chance to draw level with us, if they win their game in hand. We are making it hard for ourselves."

That has certainly been the case in Newcastle's last three Premiership away fixtures. Late equalisers by Stern John at Birmingham, John Stead at Blackburn and on-loan Magpie Lomana LuaLua at Ports-mouth have cost Sir Bobby's team six points that would have left them sitting comfortably in the fourth Champions' League qualifying- round place. "It's very important for the players that we get that fourth spot," Bernard said. "We all want to play in the Champions' League. That's our mission. We all want to win something, too - and why not the Champions' League next year?"

For the time being, a win at Tottenham would represent progress, and the second-half revival of Laurent Robert against Mallorca augurs well. The Frenchman's brace of assists and his swerving 30-yard free-kick will have stirred the memory of his two stunning long-range strikes against Spurs at St James' in December in the collective White Hart Lane psyche. They may even have stirred the interest of Jacques Santini, coach of France. "If Laurent can keep playing like that he must have a chance of getting back into the French squad," Bernard said of his fellow left-flank patroller and countryman.

Like the team as a whole, though, Robert's form has been fitful of late. Indeed, he had his club manager berating him at pitch-side for much of the first half on Thursday. "You saw two different players wearing the same shirt," Robson said of his No 32. "No wonder managers go grey, or white in my case, and lose their jobs.

"At half-time I told Laurent to wake up. Before the break he flung across one pathetic corner and it took him 17 minutes to get back into position. In the second half he was suddenly a player again. His delivery was perfect and he hit that smashing free-kick through a wall of defenders. Amazing!

"When I finally get him right I will be 120 years of age. When he is right, he is a sensation, as he was in the second half on Thursday."

Worryingly for Spurs, Robert was not the only offensive Magpie who eventually got it right on the night. Craig Bellamy was something like his feisty self and Alan Shearer, like his Welsh accomplice, was also on the goalscoring mark. Only last week Ruud Gullit was wondering why the Newcastle captain had been christened Mary Poppins. After a 20th pop-in of the season, it is perhaps not so difficult to understand why.