By Peter Donnelly
March 6 2003

Newcastle narrowly lost their game in-hand on Wednesday night, against Middlesbrough at the Riverside Stadium. Geremi's 62nd-minute header was enough for them to gain a 1-0 win, though our position in the table doesn't change. In the first half Kieron Dyer fluffed two good chances after being feed through onto the edge of the box only for his shots go wide, on both occasions.

There wasn't many chances created by either team but Boro managed to create and score one on 62nd minutes.

French left-back Quedrue got down the left and was allowed to cross into the box towards Geremi who headed the ball home, into Given's far left corner. Titus Bramble could have been marking Cameroon internation a lot tighter and Aaron Hughes certainly should have at least put in a better attempt to block the cross.

However, the main culprit was probably the referee, Andy D'Urso. In the build-up to the goal there was a clear foul on Jermaine Jenas by Jonathan Greening, though D'Urso, despite standing about 3-yeards away from the inccident, took no action.

Nevertheless, it was up to us to defend after that.

This was a game which we did not want to lose after the Boro clearler postponed the original fixture date in order to have a better chance against us this time. It turns out they got their way and I'm sure they'll celebrate their massive "derby" win for a long time yet.

Anyway, we are still 3rd in the league with a great chance to qualify for the Champions League. I just hope Sir Bob works on Hughes in terms of closing down, on the training ground.