Pardew rallies his Newcastle troops

Alan Pardew has called on his Newcastle players to secure their Premier League status and avoid being dragged into a relegation scrap.

Newcastle lost 4-0 at Stoke City on March 19, their last match ahead of the break for international fixtures.They remain 11th in the table, but are only four points clear of the relegation zone with eight games left.Pardew, who took over at St James’ Park in December, believes it is vital the team pick up points quickly when they return to domestic action on April 2. “We can?t get ourselves down about the Stoke game because we?ve got to make sure that the character and the fight in the dressing room comes through now in these last eight games,” Pardew said.”I think we?ve got enough in there to do that but we?ve got to make sure we do it quickly.””We don?t want to get ourselves in that dogfight with three or four games left to go.””So in the next four games we need to get those two results that will see us home.””We smarted about the Stoke game for a couple of days and look forward to the next home game, hopefully with a full house and get that win that we want.”Newcastle’s next outing is at home to relegation candidates Wolverhampton Wanderers.