Newcastle draw blank without Shearer

English FA Premiership: Newcastle United 0 - Charlton Athletic 0 Newcastle United remain unbeaten under the temporary stewardship of Glenn Roeder and last night's point saw them move above Fulham in the Premiership, but any satisfaction gained was offset by the realisation that life without Alan Shearer is going to be troublesome.

Newcastle have scored only 24 goals in 26 league matches and Shola Ameobi's glaring miss from four yards out in the 76th minute summed up a frustrating night. It was less so for Charlton and Alan Curbishley. Their point leaves them 12th and closer to another season of Premiership football.

The play was entertaining in a curious way, lots of tidy midfielders pinging passes around in five-a-side fashion. But with each manager deploying lone strikers for differing reasons, there was always the strong possibility a packed midfield would dominate.

So it proved, and though chances were created at both ends, it was a sign of the respective forwards that neither Shay Given nor Thomas Myhre had spectacular saves to make. Given was forced to rectify a rash rush off his line close to the end to deny Darren Bent and Jean-Alain Boumsong even made important interventions as Charlton came to life in the last 15 minutes. But there was to be no breakthrough.

Graeme Souness was Newcastle's manager when this fixture was postponed three days after Christmas because of snow. Part of the change since his departure is the style of football under Roeder and Newcastle were again sent out with the instruction to pass and move.

But there was no Kieron Dyer; his hamstrings had not recovered from the Southampton game on Saturday. Nor was there Shearer, and Stephen Carr, Michael Owen and Steven Taylor were also missing. Yet there was not one gripe beforehand.

Newcastle still had the better of the first-half chances, Myhre making saves from Emre, Ameobi, Lee Bowyer and Boumsong, and Emre also hitting the bar with an inswinging corner.

But Charlton were sprightly going forward too, and were given encouragement almost every time Boumsong threw himself reluctantly into a challenge.

Darren Ambrose, returning to St James' Park, was lively on the left and Darren Bent was profiting from the lack of co-ordination between Boumsong and Titus Bramble.

At the beginning of the second half Newcastle's two central defenders were faced by Darren Bent, and Boumsong did well on this occasion to see off Charlton's lone striker. Bramble, meanwhile, pulled up with what looked like a hamstring injury. He hobbled off to be replaced by Albert Luque.

There was still a lack of an end product, as illustrated by a Charlton breakaway that petered out even though they had four attackers against two backtracking Newcastle defenders.

That was the visitors' tactic now as Newcastle, continuing to be pushed forward by Emre and Solano, pressed in ever greater numbers.

But Shearer's absence, which was felt against Southampton in the FA Cup, was now having a serious Premiership impact, even though Ameobi was striving to bridge the enormous gap.

NEWCASTLE UNITED: Given, Ramage, Bramble (Luque 55), Boumsong, Elliott, Solano, Parker, Bowyer, N'Zogbia, Emre, Ameobi. Subs not used: Harper, Faye, Clark, Chopra. Booked: Parker.

CHARLTON ATHLETIC: Myhre, Young, Perry, Hreidarsson, Spector, Kishishev, Holland, Hughes (Euell 70), Ambrose, Marcus Bent, Darren Bent. Subs not used: El Karkouri, Powell, Randolph, Bothroyd. Booked: Young, Ambrose.

Referee: U Rennie (S Yorkshire).