Top-four Toon push shocks Pardew

Alan Pardew has insisted Newcastle should be nowhere near competing for Champions League qualification.

The Magpies will secure a top-six Barclays Premier League finish and almost certainly earn a return to European football if they better seventh-placed Everton's result this weekend.

But as they welcome Stoke to Tyneside on Saturday a day before the Toffees head for title-chasing Manchester United, Pardew knows his fifth-placed side has punched above its weight all season, saying: "The Champions League is something that really we shouldn't be competing for, but we are, and we are going to go for that as best we can."

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