GLENN Roeder last night claimed he was "absolutely certain" that Obafemi Martins would live up to his £10m price tag in the second half of the season.

Just as Andriy Shevchenko has struggled to adapt to life at Chelsea, so the Magpies manager feels it would be wrong to castigate Newcastle's biggest summer signing for struggling to find his feet in the Premiership.

Martins will make his 17th appearance of the season when high-flying Reading visit St James' Park this evening but, despite performing impressively in last month's crucial 1-0 win over Portsmouth, the Nigeria international is still searching for his first Premiership goal on Tyneside.

His lack of success has led to increased criticism of the eight-figure price tag that accompanied the striker when he left Inter Milan in August.

But with his side desperately needing a goalscorer to spearhead a surge up the Premiership table, Roeder has insisted that Martins will come good in the final five months of the campaign.

"I'm absolutely certain that Oba will have a good second half of the season," said the Newcastle manager, who welcomed England boss Steve McClaren to the Magpies' training ground yesterday.

"I think he's starting to show a lot more signs that he's settling in and getting used to both us and the tempo of Premiership football. There are plenty of other players who are having to go through the same thing.

"Footballers don't come any bigger than Andriy Shevchenko. He's 30 years old, he's played all round the world and he cost an absolute fortune, but even he's found it difficult to adapt. And that's playing in a team that's won two Premier League titles."

While Martins looked all at sea in the early stages of his Newcastle career, recent performances against both Arsenal and Pompey have suggested that he is finally coming to terms with the increased effort that is demanded in the Premiership.

It is hardly co-incidental that both of those displays saw the African paired with the equally energetic Kieron Dyer but, just as he suffered from the lack of a regular partner in the opening months of the season, so Martins will be forced to adapt his approach again tonight.

Dyer has still to resume full training after sustaining a gash on his thigh in the win over Portsmouth, meaning that Antoine Sibierski is likely to make only his third Premiership start for the Magpies this evening.

"There's another factor that hasn't helped him (Martins)," claimed Roeder. "He hasn't had a settled partner to play with.

"This isn't an excuse - it's a fact. He hasn't had a regular partner. He played with an unfit Shola Ameobi for a few games and then, just as he was showing some promise with Antoine Sibierski, he injured his hamstring and missed a few weeks himself."

Roeder will seek to address his lack of forward options when the transfer window reopens in January.

Sir Alex Ferguson has already confirmed that Guiseppe Rossi will be returning to Old Trafford in the New Year - Roeder yesterday shrugged off the Manchester United manager's criticism of the striker's lack of first-team involvement at Newcastle - and the Magpies are likely to make the acquisition of two new strikers a priority at the start of next month.

Mark Viduka and Juan Pablo Angel - both transfer targets this summer - are likely to come under the microscope again, with Roeder revealing that he has already received assurances that transfer funds will be available.

"I've been given the confidence that I will be able to bring new players in," he said.

"I'm not going to talk numbers because whatever number I say, if we pull in one less than that, people will be saying that we've missed our target. But there will be new faces."

There are also likely to be new discussions aimed at retaining some of the players currently plying their trade on Tyneside.

With both Titus Bramble and Craig Moore out of contract at the end of the season, Roeder faces the prospect of seeing his already-threadbare defence being decimated even further.

He has warned his players that any talk of contracts will be shelved until the packed festive programme is out of the way.

"Nobody has sat down with Titus and said, 'You are getting a new contract' or 'You're not getting one'," explained Roeder. "Any talk that he has already been told that he's not getting a new contract is rubbish.

"There have been no talks with Titus or Craig Moore because, for any player, this would not be an appropriate time to talk about something like that."