THE rest of the country might be writing off Newcastle United’s chances of survival, but even though he describes himself as a “realist”, Rafael Benitez continues to insist his side will still be playing Premier League football next season.

Newcastle head to Southampton this afternoon for the first of their seven remaining matches, looking to close the six-point gap that currently separates them from 17th-placed Norwich City.

They have lost their last nine away games in all competitions, have picked up just one point from their last six matches and their last two visits to Southampton both resulted in a 4-0 defeat. As a result, it is safe to say that the statistics are against them.

A defeat today could have extremely serious repercussions, with Norwich travelling to a Crystal Palace side that have not won a league game since the middle of December, but while Benitez accepts that time is running out, he still expects his side to turn things around.

“Everybody will say, ‘Oh, Newcastle will be relegated’, but that is normal when you see the table,” said the Magpies boss. “But at the same time, I can see the players changing in training.

“My concern would be if I saw the players giving up, and I don’t see that. I can see a lot of players working so hard in training, so I still believe we can change the situation.

“My job is still to have confidence – and I have confidence. Seven games, 21 points – it’s enough to do well. I am competitive, more than optimistic, but I am also realistic and I can see the problem. But still I can see the solutions.

“So we have to keep working and we have to approach the game like at Norwich, not like, ‘Oh, it’s a problem’. No, it's a challenge and we have to try and win this game and be ready. If we cannot, then we move on to the next one because we still have games to play, points to win and we have to try.”

Nevertheless, Benitez concedes he had hoped for a quicker turnaround in terms of points when he agreed to replace Steve McClaren at the start of last month.

The former Liverpool and Chelsea boss has been reasonably satisfied with his side’s performances, especially during his first game in charge at Leicester and in the closing stages of their 1-1 draw with Sunderland, but a return of one point from his three games in charge is a huge disappointment.

Norwich’s two-game winning run has transformed the situation at the foot of the table, but Benitez accepts there is nothing to be gained from fretting about the points that have already been lost.

“I had confidence that we could be better in terms of points,” he said. “In terms of performance of the team, I think Leicester was a good game that could have been a draw.

“Sunderland, the reaction of the team was very positive. With (Aleksandar) Mitrovic on the pitch, they were under real pressure in the last five minutes. And Norwich, I think the reaction was positive again.

“Overall, the reaction of the team is a positive. But still we have to improve in terms of managing the pressure, controlling the game, and not making mistakes at the end because you pay for that.

“When I first came I was doing numbers (of points required), but afterwards I said, ‘Look, forget about the numbers’, because it is on each game. We cannot control what Crystal Palace will do, what Norwich will do, what Sunderland will do, what Swansea will do, what Aston Villa will do. What we can try to control is what we can do and give our players confidence.”

Benitez has been happy with his players’ efforts in training, although he admits with so much riding on their remaining seven games, he has avoided trying to encumber them with too many detailed tactical instructions.

“We said at the beginning, we cannot change too many things or give them too many instructions,” he said. “We were checking what they were doing before, what they were doing well, what they were needing to improve and trying to do things in a simple way.

“We gave them two or three main instructions, and afterwards we were trying to change little things with individuals too. You cannot correct everything with everybody.  Give them one or two instructions, and try to be very clear, very simple.”