Caretaker Chris enjoying best spell in charge.

Byline: Mark Douglas 

CHRIS Hughton hopes that guiding Newcastle United to an unbeaten start to the season has helped to partially rehabilitate his reputation as a manager. Through no fault of his own, the affable Hughton has been left exposed by the failings of the Mike Ashley regime - reluctantly taking the reins on three occasions after high-profile mistakes by the bumbling hierarchy.

The first two spells, which followed the departure of Kevin Keegan and Joe Kinnear's heart attack, yielded just one win as a crisis-torn United struggled desperately for form but this time, given a few months to prepare, Hughton is making a much better fist of it. Written off as an unsatisfactory temporary option by most observers of a black-and-white persuasion, he has surprised a few by leading United's threadbare squad to third in the Championship against a backdrop of players leaving and continued turmoil in the boardroom.

And while no one - least of all Hughton - would argue that he is a natural manager, his record this time around has at least partially atoned for previous failings. "This has given me more satisfaction than other spells as a caretaker, definitely," Hughton said. "First and foremost, I have always considered it a great honour to be in this position for whatever period of time.

"But what you really want to do is win football matches and as much as it is an honour, you want to come out at the end of it with points on the board. For the period I have been in charge, this is the best spell we have had, so consequently it is the most pleasing.

"It has been difficult because always as a temporary manager or as a coach, there is a lot of soulsearching after games. 'Could we have done better?' and a lot of stuff that goes through the mind. There were periods when it was very disappointing for myself. But this period we are having now is as pleasing as those ones were disappointing."

Asked what kept him going during the dark days of last season, Hughton asserts that he would never shy from a challenge. "I have never been afraid of any challenge and at any stage irrespective of the results good or bad, if I had been asked the question 'would I take it for the next game, the answer would always have been yes'," he said. Hughton will have another fearless character available to him again today as Nicky Butt returns from the hand injury which ruled him out of most pre-season and United's first three Championship games.

And the skipper returns to the fray this afternoon warning his team-mates not to feel too pleased with themselves after back-to-back wins.

"The worst thing you can do in this league is to sit back and admire your last victory because you can easily come a cropper," he said.

"On the other hand, building up momentum and confidence makes you stronger for the next match. That's the secret - stringing together a sequence of good results rather than just getting one here and there."

CAPTION(S):

RETURN Nicky Butt.