Pardew respects fans´ anger

Newcastle manager Alan Pardew claimed he respects the club’s fans frustrations after they called for his exit during their sixth straight loss.

Arsenal comfortably accounted for Newcastle in London on Monday with goals from Laurent Koscielny, Mesut Ozil and Olivier Giroud leading the home side to a 3-0 victory.

The result extended Newcastle’s losing streak in the Premier League to six matches and leaves the northern club in danger of missing out on a top-10 finish, prompting travelling fans to display banners calling for Pardew to be sacked.

One banner read ‘Pardew Out’, listing some of the most damning statistics during the 52-year-old’s tenure, but the target of their anger remained calm when asked about the protests after the game.

“Well, I think they’re frustrated,” Pardew said.

“I think we had 2,000 (fans) here tonight that made this long, long trip here and although we’re playing a good team, they expect us to win and they’ve seen us lose again and they’re not happy, and I have to respect that.

“But all I can do as a manager is to make sure that I do this job to the best of my ability. You know, we’ve been top 10 all year; this recent run is not something I’m hiding from.

“We should have performed better in this run.”

Newcastle have scored just one goal and conceded 17 in their losing run, while they have won just twice since the start of March.

On Monday at the Emirates, Arsenal took the lead in the 26th minute when Koscielny stabbed Santi Cazorla’s free-kick home from close range, while Ozil doubled the hosts’ lead three minutes before half-time, converting the rebound after Giroud had two shots saved.

Ozil then teed up Giroud for a header in the 66th minute to cap off Arsenal’s triumph.

Pardew nominated Ozil’s goal as the killer blow for his team.

“Coming to Arsenal, especially with Ozil and (Aaron) Ramsay back to full fitness, is a difficult place to come, and I thought they were very imaginative and caused us problems tonight,” Newcastle’s manager said.

“But we defended really well in that first period and had a good foothold in the game until the first goal and probably that period before half-time was costly for us.”

The loss leaves ninth-placed Newcastle just three points clear of Crystal Palace, who are 11th in the table, with two games left and Pardew hopes the Geordie fans back his team on Saturday against Cardiff as they continue to battle for a top-10 finish.

“It’s very, very important that our stadium gives us the same opportunity that they did against Swansea when it was, actually, a good atmosphere for us to play under,” he said.

“We’ve got the best fans in the world and I really hope that on Saturday we give them something that they deserve because they don’t deserve the recent run that we’ve offered up to them.”