NIKOS DABIZAS knows Newcastle United face a tall order at Aston Villa tomorrow night - in the shape of giant striker Peter Crouch.

The 6ft 6in Crouch, who completed a £4m move from First Division Portsmouth on the eve of transfer deadline day, makes his home debut for Villa against the Magpies.

And Dabizas, given a taste of what he will face after tangling with 6ft 4in Duncan Ferguson in the rout of Everton on Good Friday, joked: "We are going to take a ladder to Villa Park and gain special permission from the referee to use it at set-pieces.

"It is amazing that he is in the Premiership but it is the only league in the world where you have so many physical players.

"Duncan is an example and I suppose it might help having faced him on Friday.

"I have also played against Carsten Jancker and he is another similar player."

Centre-back Dabizas and his defensive colleagues received a half-time tongue-lashing from manager Bobby Robson after conceding two sloppy goals, before overwhelming Everton 6-2 to boost their hopes of a Champions' League place and stay in touch in the title chase.

United let in an early goal for the fourth time in the last six games, and Dabizas admitted the trend is beginning to prey on the defence. Dabizas was the victim of Dennis Bergkamp's wizardry when Arsenal took an early lead in their 2-0 Premiership win on Tyneside four weeks ago.

And United old boy Ferguson claimed a bizarre six-minute opener on his first return to St James' Park when keeper Shay Given was caught napping by a looping effort.

Dabizas said: "In the past month we have found ourselves at least 1-0 down early on and it is starting to get to us as a defence.

"Duncan's goal was a one-in-a-thousand strike just like Bergkamp's here at the start of the month. Nobody expected either of those chances to end up in the net.

"Without ever being in trouble, we're conceding goals all the time. Sometimes it is my mistake, sometimes it is Shay's mistake and sometimes it can be Sylvain Distin's mistake.

"We are paying for individual errors and it is costing the team a bit of confidence.

"Having said that, we are determined we can get through it. We keep saying these mistakes can't happen again and in general we are defending very well, so why should they?

"Everton didn't have a sniff after the break and even their goals were freak goals.

"We were so well organised in the second half and every team in the country makes at least one bad mistake over 90 minutes.

"But in March these bad mistakes cost us. It was always going to be a tough month but to finish with a convincing victory shows that we are not out of the Champions' League race.

"On our day we can beat anybody and we are treating every one of the last seven matches as if we can win them."

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