I must say I was surprised when the Robbie Fowler deal fell through at the last minute. It had been going on for so long that it actually felt like he had been with us at Manchester City for about a week!

We met up with him at our Carrington training ground on the day he had his medical and we all thought that was it and he would be a City player in time for Saturday's game at Newcastle.

I came into the club on Friday expecting to see him only to be told by one of the players ‘Haven't you heard? He's not coming.'

As I said it was a surprise because normally when clubs agree a fee and a player agrees terms it's pretty certain that they will join. It's rare for a player to decide not to come after taking a medical, normally it's the club that would make such a decision.

But for one reason or another, and there has been a lot of speculation as to why, it was not to be.

I still believe that someone will be brought in before the transfer window closes at the end of the month, after all the club has made it clear that they are in the market for a new striker.

Fellow forward Darren Huckerby and I were talking about it the other day and we were both wishing that something would be sorted soon so that we all know were we stand.

As I thought last week, I was chosen to partner Nicolas Anelka at St. James' Park against Newcastle.

I was reading the match programme just before kick-off and came across something I wish I had never seen. It said that Newcastle had not lost a game this season when they had scored first. I just thought to myself ‘I did not need to read that'.

Our manager Kevin Keegan also mentioned the need to prevent Newcastle from scoring early. As a former manager at the club he said it was important not to give their fans, among the most passionate in the country, any encouragement whatsoever. So you can imagine how I felt when after ten seconds we were already a goal down.

I remember what happened clearly. I took the kick-off and passed the ball to Nicolas. Under pressure from one of their players he passed back to Steve Howey and he in turn played the ball back to our goalkeeper Carlo Nash.

I had headed up field and maybe got about ten or 15 yards before I realised the ball was not going to be coming my way.

I saw Carlo take a touch and push the ball a couple of yards in front of him. It looked like a good touch and I was just expecting him to take a couple of steps and then strike it. But he slipped with his standing foot and by the time he recovered Alan Shearer had closed him down and his clearance hit him as he was running in. The ball fell into Alan's stride and he was able to knock it into the empty net.

It was at that moment that I remembered what I had read in the programme!

After that it was always going to be an uphill battle for us.

A game that we could have been a bit wise about had become very difficult, very quickly.

Although our confidence wasn't sapped immediately as the game wore on it gradually began to diminish.

I had one opportunity in the first-half when a defender tried to head the ball back to his goalkeeper and got his angles wrong.

I knew I would reach the ball before Shay Given and I had two options - I could either slide and knock ball back diagonally towards the goal and hope it didn't hit Shay and went in.

Alternatively, I could take a touch around him as he came straight out and then slot it in.

I decided to go with the last option but the ball was bouncing and I missed it. I ran right across it and Shay was able to smother it.

If I had taken the first option I would have got there before him and if I was able to miss him I feel certain I would have scored.

I still think what I did was right but at the time you have a split second to make a decision and on this occasion it didn't work out.

Later in the half I set up Ali Bernabia with a chance that he put against the post. It was close to half time and if that had gone in the complexion of the game would have changed and who knows what the end result might have been. It didn't and if anything they came out stronger than us in the second half.

I had one more chance when the ball fell to Marc Vivien Foe on the edge of the box and he miskicked.

The keeper was out of his six yard box and I remember seeing the ball and trying to scream to Marc ‘time!' because I could see there was no one behind him. There was enough time for him to control the ball before shooting.

However, he tried to hit it first time, missed and it continued bouncing towards me.

I was almost turned with my back to the goal when the chance came and had to swivel and hit it. I didn't catch it with a lot of power and Shay managed to recover his position and make a comfortable save.

That was my last real involvement in the match and I was substituted after 60 minutes.

I felt sure I was going to be substituted before the decision was actually made and, to be fair, I wasn't having my best game.

We now have until next Wednesday before we play again when we take on Fulham. The extra break will give us chance to work on what let us down at the weekend and hopefully we will get back on track and come away with a positive result.