LIKE a child bombarded with toy adverts, December cannot come soon enough for some Newcastle United supporters.

It is not so much excitement at what the lead-up to Christmas will bring which is dominating the thoughts of some of the Magpies’ more pessimistic fans, more the fear of what is looming first on the horizon.

With Manchester City, Manchester United and Chelsea next on the fixture list, they may as well just fast forward until December 10, when a trip to Norwich City offers their next winnable fixture.

But the Magpies have made a habit of defying expectations this season, and Alan Pardew has no intention of stopping now.

It is why Newcastle’s manager has set his team a target of one more win from three mood-defining games.

“If someone offered me three points from these three games I’d take it,” he said of the challenge awaiting one of only two teams unbeaten in the Premier League (City are the other). “Will I get three draws? I can’t see me getting three draws against these three, so I need to win one.

“And I might want to win two? That would be a good philosophy of how I’m going into the games.”

As well as pitting the Premier League’s only unbeaten sides together, today’s game at Eastlands will see two of the division’s best young goalkeepers go head to head.

With the paucity of goalkeeping talent available to them, 24-year-old Joe Hart is comfortably established as England’s number one. Having unseated Steve Harper at St James’ Park this season, 23-year-old Tim Krul’s next challenge is to work his way up from being the Netherlands’ third choice.

“For the neutral, for the media, it’ll be a good comparison between the two keepers,” Pardew reflected. “They’re both of similar size and have similar attributes, they’re both very good on the backpass and their distribution is good.

“Of course, the most important thing, is that they’re great at making saves. They’ve both done terrific.

“I really like Joe Hart, he’s an excellent goalie and he’s done brilliantly for England.”