Yohan Cabaye says sorry for Newcastle United’s Craven Cottage collapse

YOHAN Cabaye has apologised to Newcastle fans for the club’s capitulation at Craven Cottage.

Cabaye and his team-mates left the field desperately disappointed after Saturday’s heavt defeat.

But the midfielder is confident Newcastle can put the club’s heaviest defeat of the season behind them when they visit Brighton in the FA Cup at the weekend.

Cabaye, pictured right, who passed a late fitness test on the ankle he injured against QPR to line up against Fulham, said: “I apologise to them (the fans). I don’t know what to say – it’s difficult for us. We just have to forget Fulham now, and look forward.

“We have the FA Cup next weekend at Brighton, and this for us is a massive objective. We have to be ready for the game. We just need to learn from the defeat and keep working at it.

“It was a very bad afternoon for us – it was like there were two games in 90 minutes.”

“In the first half we played very well, and in the second we played very badly. We were very poor with the ball and without the ball.

“I don’t know why, but maybe we thought the game was won at half-time. In the end, we lost 5-2, and it was very, very bad.”

Fulham were sloppy in the first half and Newcastle took advantage.

Fabricio Coloccini went close, firing a right-wing cross goalwards, only to be denied by David Stockdale but the visitors scored soon after when Danny Guthrie rattled home a superb 25-yard strike.

Fulham started the second half much better and earned a penalty six minutes into the second period when Damien Duff was brought down by Davide Santon, although the contact looked just outside the box. Santon avoided a second booking, but Danny Murphy sent Tim Krul the wrong way from the spot.

The Cottagers were now in the ascendancy and only last-ditch defending stopped the home side taking the lead from an outswinging Murphy corner in the 56th minute. First Krul reacted well to stop Zamora netting from close range, before Chris Baird saw his follow-up deflected over.

Fulham continued to press though and after neat interplay between Johnson and Zamora, Krul parried the latter’s shot across goal and Dempsey bundled home at the far post.

Fulham’s third came in the 65th minute. Again neat interplay between Fulham’s strikers started the goal as Johnson laid off to Zamora and he played through Dempsey, who showed composure to fire across Krul.

It was 4-1 three minutes later when Johnson shrugged off a rough challenge by Mike Williamson before being hauled down by Krul, who received a booking and was then beaten from the spot by Zamora.

Newcastle pulled a goal back five minutes from time as Hatem Ben Arfa jinked past John Arne Riise to fire home, although Dempsey soon ended any hopes of a comeback with his hat-trick goal – bursting through the middle to latch onto a Zamora chipped pass and firing past Krul.