DEMBA Ba is adamant Newcastle's confidence will not be rocked by their opening Premier League defeat of the season.

The Magpies' 11-game unbeaten run finally came to a halt at the weekend as league leaders Manchester City recorded a deserved 3-1 win at the Etihad Stadium.

Newcastle matched their opponents for the majority of the first half, but were undone by the concession of two quick goals before the interval and were unable to haul themselves back into the game in the second period.

The defeat represents the first real challenge to the buoyancy that has been evident within Alan Pardew's squad this season, but Ba does not expect it to undo too much of the good work that has been done in the last three months.

“We have some very strong characters in the dressing room and I am sure this result will not affect us,” said the striker, who was unable to convert either of two decent opportunities before City scored. “We are not going to struggle mentally just because of one defeat.

“We played well. We might not have had much of the ball in the first half, but I thought we defended really well. And in the second half we played higher and were able to press them more.

“The challenge now is to come back from this because we have another big game coming up next weekend.”

That game is against the second placed side in the table, Manchester United, but despite Newcastle's abject recent record at Old Trafford, Ba insists he and his team-mates will head back across the Pennines with confidence.

Saturday's game might have been different had the Magpies converted their chances, and a repeat of their effort and commitment in five days time would at least give them a chance of springing a surprise.

“We go to Manchester United, but I think we will still have plenty of confidence after this,” said Ba. “It was our biggest challenge of the season, and even though we didn't win, I still think we played well.

“If we play like this next weekend, but just take the chances that come our way, I definitely think we can get something from Man United. What we showed here, we just have to make sure we show it again next week.

“If we do that, but bring a little something more in front of goal, I am pretty sure we will be okay. We should also have some of the other players who were injured and that can only help make us even more competitive.”

Cheik Tiote, Gabriel Obertan and Leon Best should all be available for the trip to Old Trafford, with the former having trained on Saturday morning and the latter having only just failed a fitness test ahead of this weekend's game.

Pardew will be delighted to see his injured players returning, but Hatem Ben Arfa in particular has given him something to think about ahead of the game with Manchester United.

The Frenchman was Newcastle's most creative player by a distance against City, and it will be interesting to see if his display was deemed good enough to warrant an extended run in the side.

“I enjoyed playing with Hatem,” said Ba. “He is very talented but he is also a very clever player as well. He gave me the ball for my first chance, and I think me and him were probably the only people in the stadium expecting it. I feel like there is a good understanding there already.”