Yesterday at West Ham you suffered your first League defeat (3:0). On the match as a whole there is nothing more to say. The London club absolutely deserved their victory.

Clearly, West Ham deserves the three points. Our side was really useless. Compared with the previous games we were much too nice. We let them push us around, they could calmly develop their game and they were gaining confidence as the minutes passed. They tried things and it worked. 

Contrary to your usual game, you (the team) created very few chances. What didn't work?

What do you want to do if you don't have the ball? The midfield never had the ball so you can imagine what that meant for the attack. However, I don't know why the team played like that yesterday. It was pretty bizarre. 

How did it go for yourself?

I had one shot blocked and I put in one cross. That's all. There was not much from me, just like the rest of the team. 

Your defence was once again facing big problems. As you told us last week, Newcastle has to find solutions if they want to stay in the top group. 

Absolutely. But in order to change that we have to be a lot meaner. You can concede goals, that happens to everyone, but you have to keep them to a minimum. You can't allow (the opponent's) strikers to wander around our 18-yard area. We are playing our outstanding game against Leicester on Wednesday and I hope that one will go a bit better. Sylvain (Distin) got to play towards the end of yesterday's match and he may be starting on Wednesday. We don't know yet what the exact line-up will be but it is a possibility. 

But sure Sylvain Distin can not solve the problems on his own!

Certainly not but if he plays, with his physique, he can be quite some help. 

One would assume that Bobby Robson is trying to sort out the gaps in the defence. How is he going about it?

Truth is, I don't know too much about it. As he talks real fast I understand not everything he says (laughs). It's not easy to catch it all. But I know that this morning, he was yelling. He made them move quite a bit because he doesn't think it's normal that teams who allegedly are weaker than us should play without meeting any resistance.

Are you worried?

It's better to lose 3:0 against West Ham and win our next two matches. Now we have to get our heads up and stick together. That's football. One day you win, one day you lose. But the Wednesday match is very important. We have to win at all costs as a victory would put us fourth again together with Arsenal and Manchester.

As for you, there should be no reason for you not to start against Leicester.

Normally I should be playing. But my heel is sore again. The pitch yesterday was very hard, I played with screwed-on studs and the pain returned. But that should pass in the next two days. Cheers.