Same story at St James' Park as defensive lapses prove so costly

BOOS have accompanied the final whistle at St James' Park for many a year. But the howls of derision, which greeted the end of Saturday's contest with Fulham, were more to do with the club's failure to address its perpetual defensive failings than a dissatisfaction of the team's performance.

A Scott Parker inspired Newcastle dominated Fulham for 80 minutes before the club's Achilles heal - absent concentration levels - allowed the Cottagers to steal the points in a game where they hardly deserved any.

Peter Ramage may have been unfortunate to slip in the lead up to the first goal, but serial blunderer Titus Bramble was the guilty protagonist once again.

When substitute Wayne Routledge crossed from the right Bramble allowed Brian McBride the time and space to poach at the far post.

Five minutes later the absent minded defender overlooked his marker and Carlos Bocanegra was on hand to tap in after the unattended McBride was allowed acres of room to crash a header off the crossbar.

While Bramble has displayed all the attributes of becoming a top class defender, his four years on Tyneside have been peppered with perpetual costly errors. And at 25-years-of-age you wonder whether he will ever fulfil his potential.

His manager Glenn Roeder did not mention names but it was quite clear who he felt was the guilty culprit.

"We gifted them the game," said the annoyed boss. "For 80 minutes I thought we were worth the lead, but a couple of minutes of madness has cost us the points when we had them in our pocket.

"I certainly coach the players and I certainly got coached myself that if you can't touch or see the player you're supposed to be marking you're in a bad position.

"McBride had a completely free header and the person who was supposed to be marking him definitely didn't mark him and definitely couldn't see him.

"It was an awful piece of defending."

But exasperated supporters want to know why the club continues to ignore the endemic error-ridden defensive problem, which has dogged United's progress for the best part of a decade, to pursue a policy of chasing trophy strikers. There is no doubt a replacement for Alan Shearer was required, but so too was the need for a dominant centre back or two.

Jonathan Woodgate's commanding performance in Middlesbrough's 1-1 draw at Arsenal would have been noted on Tyneside.

Perhaps the lure of playing for his home-town club was too much for the defender, but Chairman Freddy Shepherd acknowledged after Woodgate's sale to Real Madrid that: "we have first refusal if he ever leaves" the Bernabeu.

Woodgate's injury problems have been well documented, but even if the Magpies had managed to get 15 games from his loan spell, it would have been worth it.

But if Newcastle's transfer policy is misguided then the empty rhetoric, which usually proceeds it, is positively perplexing.

Roeder insisted in pre-season the Magpies were only interested in bringing players to the club with Premiership experience.

The arrival of United's latest trophy striker, Obafemi Martins, who has zero Premier League experience, makes his statement all the more confusing.

If other foreign imports are to be used as a barometer it will take Martins the best part of a season before he picks up the pace of the English game.

Although it would be unfair to judge the Nigeria international on his two fleeting performances, supporters still must be wondering whether the £10m splashed out on Martins would have been better spent on the proven Premiership talents of Tottenham's out of favour England international Jermain Defoe - a former charge of Roeder's at West Ham.

And after the profligacy of Albert Luque's signing, you would have thought the club had learned its lesson. Apparently not.

The former Inter Milan striker was hardly involved in Saturday's contest and the game largely passed him by.

His first touch was poor, there was no evidence of his reported blistering pace, he headed one goal scoring opportunity back across the goal and, snatched at two other half-chances presented to him, before he was replaced by Giuseppe Rossi.

"I think we have to take a couple of things into consideration," Roeder pointed out. "He's trying to regain full physical fitness from when arrived from Italy with flu.

"I never expected he would get through 90 minutes and I thought he would do very well to get through 70 minutes.

"He's come from Serie A and it will take a while for him to get used to the high tempo of the Premiership. But I think I saw enough promise when he plays with Shola Ameobi that there is going to be a successful partnership there.

"He is a very young player and these are new surroundings for him. The more he plays with Shola the more he will get an understanding of working with him and the high tempo of the Premiership."

The Newcastle manager may be right.

Martins probably will need time to settle in to his new surroundings - but, the question which begs to answered is will the Newcastle chairman allow Roeder that same luxury and privilege