Allardyce on thin ice as fans and board get frosty

When Graeme Souness managed Newcastle United he repeatedly likened the club to "a banana republic". Some things refuse to alter and almost two years, plus a change of ownership, after his exit life on "Planet Toon" appears as unstable and suffused with political tensions as ever.
Following a humiliating defeat - which, had Fernando Torres worn his shooting boots, would have been far heavier - Newcastle's latest manager duly bore the troubled look of a president of a country fearing an imminent coup d'état.

"There's Chinese whispers, some people are coming up with disruptive rumours," said Sam Allardyce when asked to respond to suggestions that his players were underwhelmed by his long-ball tactics and toughened training regimes.

A popular uprising against Allardyce in the Gallowgate End had earlier seen the former Bolton manager subjected to vicious booing when he withdrew Emre and Charles N'Zogbia, potentially Newcastle's most creative players. Backed up against a wall in a stadium corridor with a score of reporters' dictaphones thrust towards his face, "Big Sam" suddenly looked unexpectedly vulnerable and admitted: "I've never been in a predicament like this before."

A Geordie crowd has surely never turned on a manager quite so quickly or violently and Allardyce did not entirely convince when he claimed: "If people don't like me, it's up to them but it doesn't bother me."

Rafael Benítez does not much care for Newcastle's manager either and the Liverpool manager evidently relished exacting revenge for some roughings-up at the hands of Allardyce's Bolton.

By fielding Lucas Leiva as a quasi- sweeper in front of his defence, the Spaniard had cleverly protected Liverpool from the perils of the "second ball", namely the fall out from Newcastle's forward punts. Meanwhile his decision to deploy Torres, the excellent Dirk Kuyt and Harry Kewell as a front three flummoxed a weakened home defence in which Geremi seemed alarmingly clueless as to whether he was a wing-back or a right-back.

Although Benítez continues to play a dangerous game of "sack me if you dare" with the club's American owners, his improving side - who certainly seemed to be playing for him here - are unbeaten in the Premier League this season and Anfield regulars may well rebel should Tom Hicks and George Gillett wield the axe with the team in title contention.

Paradoxically Allardyce's relationship with Mike Ashley and Chris Mort, Newcastle's owner and chairman, appears appreciably more cordial. While defeats at Blackburn next Saturday and at home to Arsenal the following midweek could yet leave Allardyce mortally wounded, Mort seems fully to understand that a man appointed by his predecessor, Freddy Shepherd, is endeavouring to alter a long-standing and often self-destructive culture of under-achievement on Tyneside.

Seen in this context, the fans' impatience is unreasonable but Allardyce's principal problem is that he is trying to build success on the back of an unattractive, ultra-pragmatic, percentage game that would have been anathema to Kevin Keegan and Sir Bobby Robson.

If he trusted his players' creative abilities more and allowed some scope for improvisation while continuing to imbue the club with a more professional mind-set, he might just survive.

Significantly a weekend interview with Titus Bramble, now at Wigan, saw the former Newcastle defender admit he had gone out "too much" while on Tyneside and reveal that, rather than the "five or six" players widely dubbed "party boys", there had actually been "11 or 12" in a hedonistic St James' Park dressing room. Although many of those have now, like Bramble, moved on, Allardyce is battling to instil an unprecedented level of discipline at a club traditionally much bigger on glamour than grit.

Steven Gerrard exudes both and the England midfielder's impressive response to much mindless booing from home fans was to give his side the lead courtesy of a sublime free-kick.

Newcastle have long been incapable of defending dead balls and, from a Gerrard corner early in the second half, Sami Hyypia's backheel was allowed to reach the unmarked Kuyt who saw the ball fly off his shin and in past Shay Given. By the time Gerrard's surging run and exchange of passes with Ryan Babel resulted in a goal for the substitute, Torres had missed five glaring chances.

Given said of one of the grimmest afternoons in his time on Tyneside: "I've been here 10 years but that performance was right down there with the worst of them. Confidence is a bit low, we are all a bit shell-shocked."

It does not help that Newcastle's current side contains several Allardyce signings, including Habib Beye, David Rozehnal and José Enrique, without previous Premier League experience. As Given reflected: "The new players have to speed things up, they have to do things quicker."

If not, the man who signed them will be Toon history.

Man of the match: Steven Gerrard

The selfless Dirk Kuyt was impressive but Gerrard eclipsed the Dutch striker, silencing the jeers of post-England ignominy by scoring one goal, creating two and dominating midfield.

Best moment His goal, a superb free-kick from 25 yards

Match Facts
28' 0-1 Gerrard
46' 0-2 Kuyt
60' Butt
66' 0-3 Babel
79' Sissoko
87' Beye
90' Smith

Newcastle
Shay Given, Habib Beye, Jose Sanchez Enrique (Stephen Carr), David Rozehnal, Nicky Butt, Belozoglu Emre (Joey Barton), Njitap Geremi, Charles N'Zogbia (James Milner), Obafemi Martins, Alan Smith, Mark Viduka

Liverpool
Jose Manuel Reina, Alvaro Arbeloa, Jamie Carragher, Steve Finnan, Sami Hyypia, Steven Gerrard (Peter Crouch), Harry Kewell (Ryan Babel), Lucas Leiva, Mohamed Sissoko, Dirk Kuyt (John Arne Riise), Fernando Torres

Referee: Wiley, A

Venue: St James' Park

Attendance: 52,307

Corners:
Newcastle 0
Liverpool 8

Goal Attempts:
Newcastle 6
Liverpool 17

On Target:
Newcastle 2
Liverpool 11

Guardian Unlimited © Guardian News and Media Limited 2007