Newcastle 1 Portsmouth 4:There are two things you can apparently rely on at Newcastle United. A manager struggling to meet the demands of public expectation and central defenders who, upon arrival at St James' Park, appear to forget the basics of their trade. Certainly that is the position Sam Allardyce finds himself in with the season less than three months old, and it is an affliction which has already hit the Brazilian centre-back Cacapa, whose encouraging early performances following a free transfer move from Lyon have quickly been forgotten.
It is a reflection of the nature of Premier League football that Allardyce, who was appointed only in May, is already having his future debated. But this is football Newcastle-style, where trophy droughts date back to the swinging Sixties and the pressure of history engulfs a new manager.
But there is something irresistible about the challenge, a fascination with trying to succeed where so many others have failed that still makes the job attractive.
Since Kevin Keegan first breathed life back into English football's quintessential sleeping giant back in 1992, five managers, excluding caretakers, have tried and failed to turn the club's vast potential into silver pots. Allardyce is the sixth.
A fortnight ago, the former Bolton manager was celebrating the club's most successful start to a Premier League campaign in 11 years. An away defeat to Reading and a pummelling at home to Portsmouth later and he has been forced to listen to the first rumours about his departure.
Like Portsmouth, Newcastle had begun to talk about Europe after a solid start to the season, but if the table shows a five-point difference between the two after Pompey's win, the respective performances on Saturday suggested a far bigger gap.
Portsmouth were too strong for Newcastle, who were three goals down after 11 minutes as the new-look defence constructed by Allardyce collapsed. A wonderful long-range strike from the left-back Noe Pamarot got things started, before Benjani Mwaruwari and John Utaka charged through the middle of an obliging back four to extend the lead.
Newcastle did pull one back when Michael Owen's shot rebounded off the goalkeeper and in off Sol Campbell, but that was the extent of their comeback. Niko Kranjcar added a fourth when Steven Taylor at right-back failed to block his free-kick.
Embarrassingly for Allardyce, the player largely responsible for Newcastle's defensive frailty was Cacapa. Held up by Allardyce as an example for the rest of Newcastle's defenders to follow after a 3-1 win over Tottenham a fortnight ago, he was hauled off by his incensed manager after just 18 minutes against Pompey after his mistakes in two cringe-worthy minutes were punished by goals.
Benjani summed things up neatly when he suggested the last time he had seen defending as poor as Newcastle's he was still at school in Zimbabwe.
