A wintry weather forecast dictated that the roads and pavements surrounding St James' Park were heavily gritted last night but, once inside the stadium, the atmosphere proved far less frosty than expected.
The conditions may have swiftly turned surprisingly treacherous for Edwin van der Sar but, for those of a black and white persuasion, "Planet Toon" suddenly seemed to have assumed an unusually balmy microclimate all of its own.
Accordingly by the ninth minute we were treated to the sight of a coatless Mike Ashley, clad only in an open-necked white shirt and light trousers, jumping for joy while a grinning Derek Llambias issued thumbs-up signs to all and sundry.
Considering that relegation-threatened Newcastle's still deeply unpopular owner and managing director have spent most recent games sunk deep in their seats with woolly scarves pulled tight around their throats this was quite a departure. But then it is not every night that a hitherto apparently washed up Danish winger proves that Van der Sar is mortal after all.
After 14 Premier League games without conceding a goal the Manchester United keeper's untypical fumble of Jonás Gutiérrez's shot permitted Peter Lovenkrands to direct the rebound beyond his suddenly flailing grasp.
"Their goal was fortuitous – Edwin van der Sar's made a mess of it but it was going to happen sometime," was Sir Alex Ferguson's curt assessment.
Lovenkrands is only at Newcastle on a short-term deal until May but, with one swipe of a boot he had, temporarily at least, dispersed the heavy cloud of uncertainty hanging over a club whose short-term manager, Joe Kinnear, is currently convalescing from major heart surgery.
As black and white striped shirts surged forward on the counter-attack it was possible, albeit briefly, to forget that this was a team patched together by the unsung and widely scorned caretaker manager, Chris Hughton. Significantly Kinnear's erstwhile assistant had to cope without Michael Owen, Nicky Butt and Mark Viduka but, initially at least, Newcastle were anything but cowed by the champions elect. Amazingly, this was arguably their best home performance of the season.
"We got off to a terrible start and could easily have gone 2–0 down," admitted Ferguson. "Newcastle were pumped up, Obafemi Martins put one shot by a post and it was a hairy spell for us. Newcastle were aggressive and full of tackles."
Not that the locals were getting overly carried away. There have been too many false dawns down the decades on Tyneside for that and memories are fresh of 13 years ago when Kevin Keegan's entertainers blew their infamous 12-point lead over United remain fresh.
Self-destruction looms large in the Geordie footballing psyche and, sure enough, after Wayne Rooney's equaliser, Steven Taylor flirted with a red card. Less enthralled by Cristiano Ronaldo's stepover routines than the rest of us, Taylor ended the first half by lashing an arm out at head height and dispatching him into the advertising hoardings before turning his aggression on Michael Carrick.
"Steven was a bit headstrong," admitted Hughton. "He made contact on the top of Ronaldo's shoulder."
A fine defender one minute but a liability the next, Taylor serves as a microcosm of Newcastle's contradictions. Too often ruled by his heart rather than his head – something emphasised as he allowed himself to be drawn into trading bitchy insults with Ronaldo in the tunnel – the defender's erratic nature is shared by several team-mates, most notably Martins.
Boasting the pace and creativity lacking elsewhere in this side the Nigerian striker at times petrified Nemanja Vidic and Rio Ferdinand but his parallel inability to sometimes execute the simplest of passes or dispatch the easiest chances also undermined Newcastle.
It was duly no surprise that by the time Dimitar Berbatov finally gave Manchester United the lead, bitter cold was creeping, insidiously, back into Geordie bones. Still, Newcastle can at least derive pride from a spirited performance. Hughton pronounced himself "delighted" with his side's effort but admitted that the trip to Hull on Saturday week is "massive".
He was not alone. "Hull is shaping up to be our Cup final," insisted Michael Owen, who should return at the KC Stadium.
How are the mighty fallen.
