Tony Pulis: Praise for toon threat

Stoke boss Tony Pulis believes Newcastle's goalscoring threat has been key to their "fantastic season", ahead of the two sides meeting on Tyneside on Saturday (3pm kick-off). Demba Ba leads the Magpies' goalscoring charts with 16, closely followed by new signing Papiss Cisse - who has notched ten in just nine games since his January arrival. And French forward Hatem Ben Arfa is not far away with six of his own, including a couple of outstanding individual efforts. That trio are once again expected to spearhead United's attack this weekend, as they have done for the last five games which have all ended in victories. And that has not gone unnoticed by Potters manager Pulis, told his club's official website: "They have been a surprise team, but what has happened there is they have signed quite a few foreign players and they've all come off. "They signed Ba at the beginning of the season and before Christmas he was scoring on a regular basis. He seems to have dried up a little bit, but they have taken Cisse and he is now scoring the goals. "They have had goals all season and they are strong. Cabaye is a good player, Ben Arfa has turned out to be a good player and everyone you look at has done well. "Fair play to (manager) Alan (Pardew) and everybody there - they have had a fantastic season."