Stoke City 1 Newcastle United 0

At least we can now find out whether Mike Ashley was joking or not when he said that Alan Pardew was "finished" if Newcastle United lost at Stoke.

Peter Crouch’s first-half goal condemned Newcastle to a defeat that leaves them joint-bottom of the Premier League and, in the process, brings that bizarre interview Ashley gave to a reporter outside the Golden Lion pub in Soho on Thursday night sharply into focus. Either Ashley has a strange sense of humour or Pardew is toast.

The Newcastle owner was looking on from the stands here as his club slumped to a 10th league defeat in 14 matches. Only Burnley’s pitiful goal return is sparing them from the ignominy of propping up the table and all the while the protests from the Newcastle supporters are getting louder, calling for the manager’s head and railing against Ashley’s regime. It was also easy to overlook the importance of this result for Stoke.

Fourth from bottom at kick-off, Stoke picked up their first home points of the season to climb to 11th. In truth, they should have spared themselves a nervous finale but a combination of some poor refereeing and the woodwork kept Newcastle in the game and could easily have ended up with the visitors salvaging a point when Jack Colback, from inside the six-yard box, struck the bar six minutes from time.

Even by Newcastle’s standards, the buildup to the game had been surreal. The image of Ashley performing a throat-cutting gesture when discussing Pardew’s future with a newspaper journalist following a chance meeting outside a London pub last week will take some beating. “Dead. Finished. Over. One more game, then that’s it,” Ashley is reported to have said. Ashley’s lawyers, and Newcastle, subsequently claimed that the remarks were made in jest. How Pardew and the Newcastle fans must have chuckled.

On a dank evening in the Potteries, frustration was never far from the surface. It was the 28th minute when the first “we want Pardew out” chant, complete with raised placards, emanated from the visiting end. By that point Newcastle were already a goal down and fortunate not to have conceded a penalty moments later. Only Craig Pawson, the referee, knows why he failed to point to the spot when Yoan Gouffran barged Victor Moses over inside the area. Mark Hughes was furious on the touchline and it was easy to understand why. It was a clumsy challenge from Gouffran, a classic case of an attacking player trying to defend and making a pig’s ear of things.

The one consolation for the Stoke manager was that his team were already a goal to the good, courtesy of a trademark Crouch header. It was a simple goal in its construction.

Moses, after swapping passes with Charlie Adam, shifted the ball onto his right foot before curling an inswinging cross that Crouch, towering above Fabricio Coloccini, nodded into the far corner.

That goal ought to have given Stoke a shot of confidence but their threat was sporadic in the first half and largely confined to the counter-attack, which is how the incident with Moses and Gouffran came about.

Newcastle, in fairness to them, were seeing plenty of the ball but, not for the first time this season, there was a lack of penetration when it was needed most.

The closest Newcastle came to a goal before the interval was in the 43rd minute when Daryl Janmaat drilled a 30-yard shot that was arrowing towards the bottom corner until Asmir Begovic tipped it around the post.

Pardew responded at the start of the second half by introducing Cisse for the largely anonymous Riviere, whose only notable contribution was a shot that flashed high and wide a minute before Crouch scored.

Newcastle, though, could easily have conceded a second before Cisse had a chance to touch the ball.

Arnautovic, 16 yards out when Mike Williamson’s header dropped at his feet, thumped a low shot that cannoned off the far post.

Stoke were starting to play with much more conviction and there was another reprieve for Newcastle in the 62nd minute, when the ball broke kindly for Moses on the edge of the six-yard box, after some suspect defending, only for Tim Krul to come off his line and smother.

Stephen Ireland, on for Adam, also ought to have done better wish a half chance that was wafted over. Then came that late opportunity for Colback.

STOKE CITY: Begovic, Bardsley, Shawcross, Wilson, Muniesa, Whelan, Nzonzi, Diouf (Arnautovic 23), Adam (Ireland 61), Moses (Assaidi 82), Crouch. Subs not used: Pieters, Huth, Bojan, Sorensen. Booked: Whelan.

NEWCASTLE UTD: Krul, Janmaat, Williamson, Coloccini, Dummett, Tiote, Colback, Sissoko, Cabella (Ameobi 74), Gouffran (Obertan 68), Riviere (Cisse 46). Subs not used: Anita, Elliot, Steven Taylor, Armstrong. Booked: Colback, Cisse.
Referee: Craig Pawson (South Yorkshire)
Guardian Service