Shepherd wants his Magpies to swoop

NEWCASTLE chairman Freddy Shepherd has ordered Bobby Robson’s battle-scarred troops to forget about licking their wounds and make their season one to remember.

United have been left limping into the end of an eventful campaign with four certain starters confined to the treatment room and a crippling inability to win games away from St James' Park threatening to derail their bid for Champions League qualification and UEFA Cup glory.

Saturday's Premiership defeat at Manchester City, coupled with wins 24 hours later for closest rivals Liverpool and Aston Villa, left the Magpies off the pace in the race for fourth place.

And they head for Marseille in the second leg of their UEFA Cup semi-final knowing the 0-0 draw they achieved in the first leg means the French side are favourites to go through.

However, dyed-in-the-wool Geordie, Shepherd is backing Tyneside grit and belief to spark a rousing finish to a difficult campaign and make all the hard work worthwhile.

"If you think like a winner, you will be a winner, and if you think like a loser, you will be a loser and Geordies are winners," he said.

"We still have everything to play for this season and now is the time for everyone to get behind Sir Bobby Robson and his squad. And not only that, but everything is not only in our own hands, but also in our own grasp and we can still do it.

"As far as the UEFA Cup is concerned although I sincerely hope this is not the case and we do send our best wishes to Chelsea tomorrow night we could be the only British team left in Europe by Thursday morning.

"In the Premiership, we still have that game in hand over Liverpool and Aston Villa and if we win it, everything is back in our favour. We have a home game with Wolves on Sunday, and while we are taking nothing for granted, we do have a great record at St James' Park since the turn of the year," said Shepherd.

"Liverpool are at Birmingham on Saturday, which is never an easy place to go, while Aston Villa are down at Southampton.

"Steve Bruce will be wanting to beat Liverpool for his own team, but don't forget, he's also a Geordie and he will want to win for us as well. Everybody knows that we have injuries and they are genuine injuries. We cannot do a lot about them, but we still have enough quality in the squad to end the season on a high.

"By Sunday night, we could be looking at a completely different picture."

The Newcastle squad, not for the first time this season, held a team meeting on Monday at which frank views were expressed over the disappointing display at the City of Manchester Stadium.

Each member of the squad was left in little doubt as to how important the next four matches there could yet be five if things go well in Marseille are to the club and that only the very best from all of them will do.

Robson has had some encouraging news of the injury front after Lee Bowyer returned to training following his hamstring injury and could yet make the plane to southern France, while Craig Bellamy and Kieron Dyer are jogging and may play again before the season is out.

However, Jonathan Woodgate and Jermaine Jenas have no chance and the manager is sweating on the fitness of Laurent Robert, who damaged a thigh at Manchester City.