Newcastle United need to avoid slide

Newcastle United may be sitting in the top half of the table, but depending on how they end their season they could either aim for the Europa League or have a nervous fight to secure their Premier League status.

After 29 games they are only one point off that magical '40-point' marker than seems to be the level to avoid relegation from the top flight - and Newcastle are outsiders at 33/1 to go down.

While a few weeks ago all the talk was about gunning on and going for a Europa League place, a draw with Bolton and loss to Everton seems to have ended all of that talk - though they are only theoretically two wins short of Liverpool in sixth.

Consistency seems to be a difficult thing to find for Alan Pardew's men and the manager, coupled with former boss Chris Hughton, seems to have struggled to motivate his players at St James' Park, as Newcastle have lost more than they have won in front of their home fans.

As they are not involved in the FA Cup it means they do not play again until facing Stoke on Saturday week, with Pardew hoping that time off will mean his lengthy injury list could shorten.

Joey Barton, Jose Enrique, Jonas Gutierrez, Stephen Ireland and Nile Ranger have all been carrying knocks and the likes of Hatem Ben Arfa and Alan Smith have both been ruled out for the rest of the season.

When Andy Carroll left Tyneside in January it was hoped Pardew would bring in reinforcements, but the one move he did make in bringing Ireland to Newcastle from Aston Villa has not paid off.

He has yet to make his debut and games are running out fast, so the Magpies could do with getting him on the pitch sooner rather than later.

One man who has seen it all during his time with Newcastle is veteran goalkeeper Steve Harper, and he admits even though they have been hard to beat under Pardew, the team really need to add to the three wins out of 13 they have recorded under the new boss.

The statistics show Newcastle have not won a Premier League home game with a 3pm Saturday kick-off since August 2008 and that is a fact that needs to change if they want to go onto the next level.

But with Newcastle only five points clear of the bottom three, Harper admits there is a job "still there to be done" between now and the end of the season.

He told the Newcastle Journal: "To be sitting on 39 points and to be in that top bracket, we’ve always known until we’ve got more points mathematically than the bottom three what could happen.

“The bottom three are a little bit closer to us so there’s still a lot of work to be done in the last nine games.

"It is only people outside the club who have ever assumed we would be okay from relegation. The players take nothing for granted and we’ve got nine games left to get as many points as possible."