Newcastle loss to Derby will act as 'wake-up call' insists Steve Harper

Just four days after hammering Cardiff 5-1, Newcastle United were knocked off the top of the Championship table in a 3-0 defeat by Derby at Pride Park and Harper is banking on the result ridding St James' Park of any complacency.'It's a massive wake-up call for everybody to do with the football club who thought we just had the right to go straight out of this league,' Harper said.'We have to earn it, and last night we didn't do that. That's this league it's what the Championship's like.'We were looking to get two good results away from home, but after the high of Friday night, to lose 3-0, our biggest defeat of the season, is very, very, very disappointing.'It's a massive wake-up call and we have to demand a response from everybody on Saturday.'Newcastle head to promotion-chasing Swansea this weekend and Harper has acknowledged his team have to bounce quickly to regain pole position from West Bromwich Albion.'We're together there's not going to be any splits in the camp and we need a response on Saturday,' Harper said following Newcastle's first loss in the league since they were beaten 2-1 by Scunthorpe last October. 'At Scunthorpe we demanded a response, and we've got to do that now.'Harper will be expecting better from his defenders when they head to Wales following the humbling by Nigel Clough's Derby.He continued: 'They were poor goals. From a free-kick we've been turned, and you can't give Rob Hulse a free header.'The second one's a needless penalty. He wasn't going anywhere, and we brought him down. We had a mountain to climb at 2-0.'For the third one, we've cleared it, and after we've won the initial header, we've had two chances to clear it, and the lad's hit it through a crowd.'We're 3-0 down away from home, and left ourselves a massive mountain to climb. We couldn't respond.'

Source: Telegraph