AFTER scoring the first hat-trick of his Newcastle career in Saturday's frenetic 4-2 win at West Ham, Michael Owen claimed his goalscoring talents were such that he would still find the target playing alongside a team of pub players.

His team-mates weren't that bad at Upton Park - although some of their defending would hardly have looked out of place at the Dog & Duck - but you take the striker's point.

Stick Owen in any side in the world and he will make a significant difference. As even Alan Shearer admitted on Match of the Day, stick Owen in the Newcastle side and he makes an average Premiership outfit look like genuine European contenders.

A month ago, when the Magpies last travelled to London, they took on Chelsea with neither Shearer nor Owen in the side. They created a handful of chances, defended abysmally and lost 3-0.

On Saturday, with their deadly duo back in the ranks, they took on a West Ham side brimming with confidence following Wednesday night's win at Everton. They created a handful of chances, defended abysmally and won 4-2. It does not take a rocket science to work out what makes Newcastle click.

With Owen in the side, they have taken 19 points from a possible 24. Without him, Graeme Souness' men have plundered six from 27.

The contrast is stark, and underlines one of the oldest adages around. In football, as in life, you get what you pay for and, for £16m, Newcastle have acquired one of the foremost strikers in the world. As befits his exalted status, they have also bought one of the most self-confident.

"When I came here I promised I would score goals," said Owen, who now boasts seven in eight starts for the Magpies. "But that's not really much of a promise because I've always scored goals wherever I've been.

"Even if I was playing for my local pub team, I'm sure that I'd still score goals. That's my game and that's what I'm about.

"I don't think anyone in their right mind would say that Alan Shearer will stop scoring goals until the day he hangs up his football boots. I will be the same.

"No matter what I might lose, it will always be my instinct to score. I seem to have this ability to know where the ball is going to be and that's why I'm confident I will always score goals."

Saturday's performance neatly underlined that fact. Owen's predatory instincts were far too sharp for a West Ham defence that looked every bit as shaky as Newcastle's, earning the 25-year-old a 'perfect hat-trick' containing a goal scored with the left foot, the right foot and the head.

His first came from nothing, as all great striker's goals seem to do. Sensing Tomas Repka's hesitancy in defence, Owen latched onto Scott Parker's header, exchanged a swift one-two with Shearer, and calmly chipped past the advancing Roy Carroll.

His second was equally clinical, with the England international timing his run perfectly to convert Nolberto Solano's free-kick via a combination of head and shoulder.

The hat-trick goal was the simplest, a 90th-minute tap-in after West Ham's willingness to chase the game left them wide open for an Amdy Faye-led counter-attack.

"They say it was the perfect hat-trick, one with the right foot, one with the left foot and a header," said Owen. "But the lads are saying it was right foot, left foot and shoulder.

"I did one against Moscow in the Champions League when I was with Liverpool and I'll be claiming this as the perfect hat-trick as well. Mind you, I don't suppose it was perfect really because my mum could have scored the last one."

Perhaps, although it is doubtful Owen's mother could have provided the slide-rule pass that sent Shearer galloping clear for Newcastle's third goal of the afternoon.

As well as being a master of the penalty area, Owen possesses strength of body and deftness of touch that he rarely gets credit for.

Not only does he score goals, he sets them up as well and it is no co-incidence that the previously pedestrian Shearer looks an entirely different player with Newcastle's number ten alongside him.

The United skipper was back to his best as his side out-battled Arsenal last weekend and, in another fast and furious encounter, he won everything in the air to ensure the already over-stretched Hammers defence could not direct all their attention to Owen.

Never mind the battle for Christmas number one, with Shearer's goal taking him to within one of Jackie Milburn's all-time tally, there is only one record that matters on Tyneside this Christmas.

"Alan has moved one goal closer to breaking the record and hopefully that will be a great bonus for him," said Owen.

"He has always said that the team is the most important thing, but everybody will be delighted for him if he breaks the record. He set me up for my first one and I set him up for one as well, so we both went home happy."

The same could be said of the travelling fans although, Newcastle being Newcastle, four goals were never going to be enough to ensure a trouble-free afternoon.

Owen's opener was cancelled out by the kind of comical own goal Souness' men always seem capable of scoring, with Titus Bramble hooking an attempted clearance straight into the helpless Solano, who was powerless to prevent the ball entering the net.

Despite taking the lead again before half-time, more desperate defending, primarily by the hapless Robbie Elliott, culminated in the Magpies suffering another madcap minute shortly after the break.

Shay Given saved from Marlon Harewood, Hayden Mullins cracked a vicious 25-yarder against the post, and a backpedalling Shearer cleared James Collins' shot off the line as Newcastle's goal led an increasingly charmed life.

Newcastle's third should have settled it, but still there was time for the visitors to hand, or perhaps that should be arm, the visitors a lifeline. Quite what Shola Ameobi was doing when he parried Paul Konchesky's free-kick only he will know, but the result was that Harewood converted from the spot to set up a frantic finale.

Even Carroll was thrown upfield as West Ham chased a leveller but, ultimately, Owen was not to be denied the final say.

Never mind the parallels with a pub team, Newcastle's record signing had produced a champagne performance. And, as ever, there were plenty of United fans willing to drink to that.

Result: West Ham United 2, Newcastle United 4.

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