Roeder then went on about players being bought by previous regimes who were past their sell-by date, conveniently ignoring his own signings, Antoine Sibierski and Olivier Bernard.

Perhaps most bizarre was his admission that, "We haven't got the recruitment personnel - ie the scouting network - we need, and we're working on that. We've got one full-time scout."

"Frank Arnesen, at Academy level at Chelsea, has got more than 20 full-time scouts all around the world looking for young talent under 21."

"...we've highlighted someone we want to employ. We are trying to persuade him to leave his current club to come to Newcastle, and he would help me greatly. We would be employing his address book. He has got contacts, and we haven't."

How amateurish does that last quote make our club look?

We even had Reserve coach Lee Clark getting in on the act in explaining why the second string were on such a losing streak. In giving youth a chance he cited the examples of Liverpool and Manchester United as never winning the Reserves league. This season Manchester United are again battling for the title having won it in 2005/06, 2004/05, 2001/02, and coming 3rd in 2003/04. Their first team have a similar record, I think....

And the nonsense continued even after this defeat with the unbelievable announcement that St. James' Park is to be expanded to 60,000, a matter of days ahead of what will surely be the least enthusiastic season ticket renewal in recent history.

And as for Steven Taylor's post-match quotes.... Someone give the lad a gobstopper.

"Scoring goals is something we need to improve on, and our defending as well. ...passing-wise, we gave the ball away a bit too cheaply, so there's a lot of things we need to improve on."

So, we can't score, defend or pass...? Our throw-ins and corners aren't too clever either.

For me, at least the loss against Alkmaar hurt. When those close to you can no longer hurt you, it's probably time to call it a day. That was the most worrying thing about this game. It didn't hurt. Everything about it was just irritating.

The team selection annoyed me. On what basis were Carr, Babayaro, Moore, Taylor and Duff chosen? It certainly wasn't fitness or form - with Ramage the only one who bothered to have a warm up for the reserves, only to be overlooked as Stephen and Celestine shambled back in. 

Before kick-off subs Milner, Emre and Sibierski seemed to have greater claims to be included than those they were watching - while N'Zogbia was nowhere to be seen at all.  

And after what was dished up in the form of entertainment over the opening 45, it seemed a racing certainty that one or two would appear to warm up at half time.

Unfortunately, apart from Steve Howey in a brown suit our preparations for the second half consisted of a groundsman watering the pitch - a wheelbarrow full of horse dung would probably have been of more use....

City by contrast took stock of what they'd seen in the opening 45 and swapped the ailing Hamann (making what may be his last appearance here and booed by a few diehards) with the dubious striking talents of Samaras - Pearce obviously sensing three points being there for the taking.

Playing Butt and Parker in midfield against a struggling City side seemed overly negative and restrictive - as it had done at the JJB and on other occasions. Presumably we'd have had the two holding players paired at the Valley had Butt not been suspended.

And while we're on about Parker, here's something that will fill my inbox. If Parker had been a local lad promoted from the reserves he would have got man of the match in this game. Not that he was in any way outstanding.

The whispering campaign seemingly started after some bright spark linked our positive results with Parker not being in the side seems to have gathered an incredible momentum. Every time he doesn't play a defence-splitting pass a murmur of discontent fills the ground. The "pirouette" never seemed to upset fans of Rob Lee. Some would call it retaining possession.

And then there's Titus Bramble. This is going over old ground but in my eyes Bramble's performance in AZ was way better than Taylor's but the former has now been jettisoned while the latter continues on his downward spiral. His nervy performances can no longer be explained by his youth or inexperience - he's played 79 times for us now. Tony Green became a Newcastle legend after playing just 35....

The other half of NUFC.com was at Croke Park to see Damien Duff put in an "almost decent" shift for Ireland and so his inclusion was, for once, greeted with something approaching anticipation. However, it didn't take long for him to remind us all what we hadn't been missing.

He picked the ball up in acres of space down the left and cut inside with the City defence all at sea. Parker was unmarked and charging into the box and the simplest of passes would have put him in for a certain goal but Duff decided to go on a mazy dribble to nowhere. Seconds later the City fans sang, "I saw you standing alone". Unfortunately so did everyone except Duff....

This incident seems to have been conveniently forgotten by those bemoaning Duff's lack of service. Just like his compatriot and fellow left winger, Alan O'Brien, team mates become reluctant to pass to someone so utterly wasteful.

Mind you, our midfield didn't have much else to aim at. Obafemi Martins was woeful in trying to control the ball and when he did, it was only a matter of time before he lost possession. 

Compare and contrast him with the previous number 9 in the art of holding the ball up and laying it off. Keep it simple, stupid. Martins is already doing his repertoire of stepovers and dancing feet before the ball has even got to him.

And his partner-in-crime today? Kieron Dyer - playing up front, just off the target man, isn't that wor Kieron's favourite role? So why (again) did he show dereliction of duty and start playing on the halfway line? 

With Martins being City's best player in the first half it meant that we couldn't hang on to the ball for more than two or three passes with big launches up to Oba being a bigger waste of time than cleaning Albert Luque's boots.

Mind you, Stuart Pearce's side looked worse than us until the shaky Taylor gave Mpenza all the room in the world to turn and then Moore's "after you" positional run which gave the striker a gaping hole to steady himself and fire against the bar, was surely enough to see the Aussie banished from the club, never to return Bramble-style.

Moore did get substituted after the break but that was down to his (in)ability to incorporate any attempt on the ball when stopping opponents. His assault on Vassell that saw him yellow-carded was one of many.

Finishing with eleven men seemed like a reasonable idea so I didn't take great exception to Onyewu's introduction, although I don't particularly rate the player. The boos around the ground weren't redolent of any anti-Americanism though, rather directed at Roeder for failing to introduce the player who had had his name chanted throughout the game - James Milner.

Roeder relented and sent on the winger with just 14 minutes remaining although there were many on the pitch who should have been hauled off before Solano - another chorus of boos seeing the Peruvian depart while Carr stayed on (so much for Roeder labelling Nobby his first-choice right back only a matter of weeks ago).

Sibierski replacing Dyer also didn't seem to go down too well, presumably because leaving Martins on meant we were in effect down to ten men.

In fact, it was worse than that. 

Oba again gave the ball away cheaply in an area that was suicidal. It left us chasing shadows as Johnson was able to pick out Mpenza and this time Given wasn't aided by his crossbar as the ball flew into the back of the net.

At least 10,000 Newcastle fans flounced out of the ground within minutes and I'm afraid and surprised, that included a good number of the so-called Toon Ultras. Lads (and lasses) it really has been worse than this - bad old days against bloody Wrexham and the like. 

Amazingly we then had four of five gilt-edged chances to get back on terms or even win the game. Milner provided two or three fantastic crosses and corners (and two or three not so good, it has to be said). But it was a Carr free-kick that ended up on Taylor's head a few yards out but he thumped his effort against the bar when it seemed impossible to miss.

Carr himself volleyed an unmissable effort wide and Butt was unlucky to see a scissor-kick deflected inches past the post.

The indifference that this late flurry was met with was tangible. Like Lee Clark's equaliser against Middlesbrough that kept Graeme Souness hanging on to his job by a thread, it was almost as if a Newcastle goal wasn't wanted. 

No matter how bad things get you'd think that scenario simply couldn't happen - but here we are again, a mere 15 months on.

The sponsor's man of the match was announced as Taylor, proving again that they don't actually watch the game - or had revealed their April fool a day too soon.

For me that was the ultimate insult on a day when I didn't really like anything about this club - the players, the management, the fans, the ground. Whatever aspect you care to mention, none of it deserved the efforts made to get to this game.

We've said time and time again that indifference is the biggest enemy of this club. Even in the darkest days of Division Two in the early 80s and 90s people were passionate about the demise.

Now, season tickets that have been renewed for decades will be up for grabs this summer. People are no longer feeling compelled to show the legendary Geordie loyalty and fervour. 

It's a myth they simply aren't prepared to perpetuate any more. 

And while some observers chose to summarise this loss as the closing of the door on a European place of any description, our anxious glances were directed towards the other end of the table.

Thirty seven points leaves us above the relegation scramble at present, but a continuation of our alarming downward spiral over the Easter weekend could still see us dragged into a battle at the wrong end of the table.

A few fans chose to vent their feelings outside the main entrance afterwards, but like the anti-Shepherd chants during the game, the majority didn't bother to subscribe to this form of protest. 

Instead they just wandered away, disillusioned and disconsolate. 

Niall MacKenzie

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