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Alan Pardew has blamed the World Cup for Newcastle United’s poor end of season run last season.

The Magpies chief feels that some of his players were focused on international selection ahead of the finals in Brazil and this impacted United’s form.

Top scorer Loic Remy missed a large chunk of games while Moussa Sissoko suffered injuries in the run-in.

Both Tim Krul and Cheick Tiote were also eager to make it into the squad of Holland and Ivory Coast respectively.

Pardew told one of United’s media partners the BBC: “We were affected by the World Cup, there’s no doubt about that in my mind.”

Pardew also stated that failure by the club’s board to replace Yohan Cabaye proved to be a hammer blow to the club.

He said: “We weren’t as strong then as we were in the first half of the season when we lost Yohan Cabaye and didn’t replace him, but certainly I’m expecting the team to be much stronger.”

United’s work in the transfer market has suffered a few hits with Remy Cabella at the World Cup with France and the figures talked about for Clement Grenier falling short according to Lyon sources.

Pierre-Michel Lagossa is also thought to have snubbed a move to Tyneside as Newcastle’s wage offer wasn’t acceptable in his eyes.

But Pardew hopes to send out a stronger squad next term.

He said: “That will give our fans some encouragement and some optimism as it all got very negative towards the end.

“The key ingredient is optimism and that’s something we need to give back to our fans.”