Under grey and leaden skies, Newcastle United rained goals to take sweet revenge for all that Manchester United have inflicted upon them. Winning their seventh straight FA Carling Premiership match, pounding a tired and tetchy Manchester United into the turf, they achieved victory by five clear goals - the first time in 22 years of management that this has been inflicted on a team selected by Alex Ferguson.

It was the first time since September 1989, when they went down to Manchester City 5-1 at Maine Road, that Manchester United had conceded five in the League. Not since October 1984, against Everton at Goodison Park, had they lost 5-0.

It not only put Newcastle three points clear in the Premiership table, not only avenged the 4-0 defeat in the FA Charity Shield in August, but was the biggest Newcastle scoreline against Manchester United since 1960 - 7-3 - and there have been 44 League games between them since.

"Undoubtedly the most enjoyable day I have had as a manager," Kevin Keegan said. "Our first goal was scrappy, what followed was class, we really looked like a team on a mission. Unfortunately, the League won't give us more than three points for it, but I awoke yesterday to criticism, some of it from top people, about the way we are doing it. We opened up today, we played our way, we proved that the League can be won by attacking football, as we should have done last season."

Newcastle, indeed, proved as difficult to contain as an unbroken stallion. What did break was the order, the discipline, the concentra tion with which Manchester United had given English football such a memorable night in Istanbul last Wednesday.

Five of the United side were booked - Schmeichel, May, Butt, Poborsky and Cantona, the captain, who feuded throughout with Albert. To be scrupulously fair, Manchester were weary almost before the kick-off. You could see it in the slumped shoulders of Pallister, whose sciatica problem can scarcely take two games in a week, never mind the harrowing experience on the Bosphorus, after which the players touched down in England at 4am on Thursday. This kind of scheduling - home to Liverpool, away to Fenerbahce and then travelling up to St James' Park - is an absolutely ludicrous way to run a league.

Still, Newcastle are not complaining. They were rampant without ever achieving the heights and the domination which they established over Manchester United at home last March in a game that they lost because Schmeichel was in the form of even his life.

Schmeichel had gone nine hours and nine minutes undefeated before his goal fell yesterday in the thirteenth minute. The move began when Beckham gave the ball away to Ginola. He danced past Gary Neville, withstood the barging of Beckham and passed to Ferdinand, whose shot was deflected for a corner.

Ginola took it, Shearer outjumped the defence and Peacock headed down towards goal. Irwin scooped the ball away from beneath the bar, but, as television technology was to prove, referee Dunn rightly ruled that it had crossed the goal-line.

The inevitable arguments led to Schmeichel's booking, but, although a Cantona free kick was to float alarmingly close to Srnicek's own bar, on the half-hour Ginola was to score a sublime second goal, and there was not a semblance of doubt about its quality or its merit.

Ginola turned on the left-hand edge of the penalty box and, with his right foot, hit the ball across Schmeichel, angled and arrowed for the inside of the far post. Schmeichel almost had whiplash as he turned, startled, to see the ball go by. A few minutes later, Shearer, from the same distance, struck the base of his post.

Now, with Batty ensuring that Newcastle were not beaten, as before, in the competitive area of midfield, one could positively sense the rout. However, Manchester United did not give up, and Beckham provided enough accurate ball from the right for a better finisher than Poborsky to have scored more than once.

The hunger in Newcastle, each man speaking afterwards of returning the embarrassment that they felt at Wembley in the Charity Shield, would not be repressed. After 63 minutes, Shearer produced a cross that invited Ferdinand to rise majestically. The header struck the crossbar and came down, Ferdinand for an instant looked anguished, but then ecstatic as backspin carried the ball over the line.

Shearer again was the instigator of goal number four, in the 76th minute. He began a move on the left, Beardsley had a shot clawed down, Ferdinand also was denied on the rebound, but Shearer accepted the second ricochet to beat Schmeichel.

Seven minutes from time, Albert, the man of Newcastle's defence this proud afternoon, glided forward to beat Schmeichel with a looping left-foot sliced shot. He meant it, all right.

Keegan loved it - loved it! Ferguson, of course, did not. "When you lose 5-0, you take your medicine and go home," he said. "We can take it, we'll be OK. We could have scored five goals ourselves, it was an unusual game, the biggest defeat of my career as a manager; but, I'll put it down as a blip, we'll go on from here."

St James' Park, not normally shy in expressing love of the game and adoration of its team, erupted. The crowd, a little more than 36,500, have waited and waited for such a devastating scoreline over the champions.

The public address system begged silence before announcing the man of the match: "Every player on the Newcastle United team." Away they went, singing Blaydon Races, sending Ferguson towards the tenth anniversary of his tenure at Old Trafford with a mighty hole in his record.

NEWCASTLE UNITED (4-4-2): P Srnicek - S Watson (sub: W Barton, 87min), D Peacock, P Albert, J Beresford - R Lee (sub: L Clark, 87), P Beardsley, D Batty, D Ginola - L Ferdinand, A Shearer.

MANCHESTER UNITED (4-4-1-1): P Schmeichel - G Neville, D May, G Pallister, D Irwin - D Beckham, N Butt, R Johnsen (sub: B McClair, 67), K Poborsky (sub: P Scholes, 67) - E Cantona - O Solskjaer (sub: J Cruyff, 56).

Referee: S Dunn.