LAST season, Eddie Howe’s sole target after replacing Steve Bruce was to guide Newcastle United to Premier League survival. This term, the Magpies head coach finds himself charged with the task of leading the club into the top half of the table, ideally positioning them as the ‘best of the rest’ outside the established top six and therefore fighting for a place in Europe.

In many respects, it should be an easier challenge, especially off the back of another transfer window that has seen Newcastle’s new owners spend around £100m to strengthen the squad. Yet with every step the Magpies take forward – and there have undoubtedly been some hugely significant ones on Howe’s watch – the difficulty of continuing to progress becomes apparent. The Premier League is not regarded as the most difficult league in the world for nothing, and while their new-found wealth might help, Newcastle will not be ushered into the top tier of clubs without an almighty fight from those around them.

Howe acknowledged as much last week when he spoke about the obstacles that were placed in Newcastle’s way during the transfer window, but the problems do not only exist off the pitch. On it, rival clubs have the Magpies’ cards marked too, as has been evident in the opening month of the season. Whereas last term, Howe’s side could revel in their status as plucky underdogs, battling their way to survival, now they find themselves cast as ambitious aspirants wanting to outperform and usurp clubs that were recently finishing above them. As a result, opponents treat them very differently when they line up against them.

So, while a return of one win and four draws from their opening six matches might not sound like a sensational start to the campaign, even accounting for the fact that Manchester City and Liverpool have already crossed their path and that Newcastle are without three of their key attackers and midfielders, Howe nevertheless feels it represents progress from last season. His side might currently find themselves in exactly the same position they occupied at the end of the last campaign, but he is adamant they are in much better shape.

“I’d say we’ve played a lot better this season than in the spell we had when we were winning games towards the end of last season,” said Howe, in the wake of Newcastle’s goalless draw with Crystal Palace. “I think we’ve been much better this season.

“I think if you look back at those games last season then we were without the ball for huge periods in all of those games, but we were very good defensively, managed to get a goal ahead, and clung on brilliantly well. That’s not in every game, but it was in the majority.

“I’d say our overall performance levels have dramatically improved, but with that comes different challenges because now we’re facing teams that defend a little bit deeper, we’ve got a bit more ball, and now we have to break them down rather than playing on transitions. Last season, we were playing on counter-attacks a lot at certain times during that good run. I think your strength then becomes a different thing, and you have to find answers to those problems.”

Saturday’s result suggests Newcastle weren’t able to solve the problems presented by a Crystal Palace side who have made defensive organisation and razor-sharp counter-attacking key parts of their arsenal under Patrick Vieira, although the game would almost certainly have been very different had two key moments not gone against them. One error was of their own making; the other was one of the unfathomable VAR decisions that commanded so many column inches over the course of the weekend.

Palace would have been forced to adjust their approach had Alexander Isak opened the scoring in the 16th minute, but while he was presented with a golden opportunity to crown his debut appearance at St James’ Park with a goal in front of the Gallowgate End, Newcastle’s £60m man fluffed his lines.

Galloping clear of the Palace defence after robbing Joachim Andersen of possession, Isak could have rolled the ball into either corner, but instead attempted to beat Vicente Guaita with a delicate chip. It was a strange decision, and one that backfired when he got his execution all wrong. After opening his Newcastle account in last week’s defeat at Liverpool, Isak still has plenty of credit in the bank. Even so, Howe and the rest of the Magpies’ coaching staff will be hoping Saturday’s miss does not leave a mark.

“I’ll approach him in an individual way,” said Howe. “You treat everybody as the individual that they are. He'll be disappointed to miss that because he'd back himself to score and I'd certainly back him to score, but he's gone for a certain type of finish - and that's obviously in his game – but he didn't quite execute it right.

“I thought we starved him of the ball a little bit in certain parts of the game. We're still getting used to how he wants to receive the ball and where he needs to go to receive the ball.”

While Isak failed to beat Guaita, Newcastle did have the ball in the net five minutes after the break when Tyrick Mitchell deflected Sven Botman’s header from Kieran Trippier’s free-kick into his own goal.

The goal was initially awarded, only for Lee Mason, who was in control of VAR, to spot a collision between Joe Willock and Guaita, a coming together that was deemed to be a foul by referee Michael Salisbury after he was sent to the touchline to consult his pitch-side monitor.

What neither Mason nor Salisbury failed to spot however – or what they unfathomably deemed to be unworthy of consideration – was the push from Mitchell that propelled Willock into Guaita. Had Mitchell not pushed his opponent, the ‘foul’ would not have occurred. As a result, Newcastle should either have been awarded a goal or a penalty.

“I didn’t think it should have been disallowed, personally,” said Howe. “I thought it was a foul or a push on Joe Willock in the build-up to the ball coming in.

“Joe’s momentum is fixed at that point from his opponent, and it then carries him into the goalkeeper. But without that push, there’s no way Joe would have gone in with that force. It’s not a foul – if anything, it’s a penalty if it’s not a goal. So, I was very surprised with the outcome.

“This is just my opinion, but I think they were swayed by the fact that the goalkeeper stayed down. I think that ultimately led to the goal being disallowed.”

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Patrick Vieira disagreed with Howe's assessment, claiming that Salisbury was right to disallow the goal.

"After looking at the images after the game, I thought that was the right decision from the referee,” said the Palace boss. “Was there a push? No, not at all. I think if there is not a Newcastle player then our goalkeeper will get the ball. That contact of course had a massive impact on the goal. That’s why I believed it was the right decision from the referee.”

Newcastle had other opportunities to claim a winner, but Guaita made a fine save from Willock, who also shot wide from the edge of the six-yard box, and Miguel Almiron saw a first-half effort deflected onto the base of the post.

At the other end, Nick Pope impressed again, saving from Jean-Phillipe Mateta and Eberechi Eze in the first half and producing his best moment of the game in the second period when he kept out Odsonne Edouard’s goal-bound effort with his outstretched right leg.

“The lads were very committed to their performance, and were physically very good off the back of a very difficult week,” added Howe. “We’re just really disappointed with the final action. The finish wasn’t there, but it was the only thing missing.”