Alan Pardew: “I can’t remember a defeat being as painful, if I’m honest.
“I genuinely think we could have won – we scored three goals and had some great opportunities. We hit the post and the bar.
“You’ve got to be able to defend that situation – the last goal was galling.
“We’ll be asking questions of ourselves of at least one of their goals, for sure.
“There were so many good things.
"It was such a young midfield, but a little bit of inexperience in there has let them come on to us.
“I genuinely feel for the players, but at the same time we have to learn.
“There’s no point saying ‘we’ve put in a great performance’, because we got nothing.
"It’s like a boxing match – on points you’re winning after 10 rounds, but after 12, you got beat.
“We have to let that hurt – I made my feelings very clear after that game. We should have won.
“I don’t think we’re at panic stations about where we are in the division yet – we know we’ve got players coming back.
“But some of our defending, admittedly against Man United at Old Trafford and their tradition and history, had to be better.
“We’ve got to set our standards higher than a couple of those goals.
“If we hadn’t conceded soft goals, we’d have a few more points. That’s the difference between mid-table, and where we’re at.”