Pardew hails ´ab-fab´ Newcastle

Newcastle United manager Alan Pardew believes his side is doing ‘absolutely fabulous’ and has reiterated his desire to keep Cheick Tiote.

United were the second-last English Premier League club to lose their undefeated status this campaign – after Manchester City – and are seventh on the table.

But the shine on their positive start to the campaign has been tarnished somewhat by a run of five games without victory, with defeats to City, Chelsea and Norwich ensuring they have lost pace with the league’s pacesetters.

Pardew believes injuries have played a part in Newcastle’s form drop, and has praised his men for their season to date.

“Our best team can compete with any other side in the Premier League,” Pardew said.

“Whether we’ve got a strong enough squad to keep us consistently in the top seven all year, we’ll have to wait and see. We still have a nice margin over the rest, as they say, it’s about as best we can try to keep with the pack.”

“You’re talking about a very stong group of teams – Tottenham, Liverpool, Manchester United, Manchester City and Chelsea – teams who are way ahead of us in terms of budget. We are doing absolutely fabulous, make no mistake about that.”

“So as much as we have played the top teams, we haven’t had our best team out. We are getting it back slowly but surely. (Leon) Best is back in the side, (Fabricio) Colloccini, Cheick (Tiote) … so when we go to Bolton on Saturday we won’t be far away, with just Steven (Taylor) missing. With those returning, it will strengthen our hand going into the New Year.”

Ivory Coast midfielder Tiote made his first appearance in almost two months in Saturday’s draw with Swansea City and is a reported target for some of the Premier League’s biggest clubs in the January transfer window, despite being in the early stages of a long-term deal at Newcastle.

“I’m confident that we can keep hold of him, in as much that it’s going to take a lot of money to take him out of here,” Pardew said.

“I’m not sure on how many Premier League clubs could do that. We’ll have to wait and see won’t we?”