The three points keep Newcastle's Champions League hopes alive with two games to go.

Pardew's men are only goal difference behind Tottenham in fourth and one point adrift of Arsenal in third.

Cisse's first strike, which flew into the top corner from the edge of the bo,x was superb but his second effort - a curling volley with the outside of his foot from the left into the top corner, was even better.


"It was an astonishing goal (second)," Pardew beamed. "We were seeing the game out at 1-0, Cisse took a chance and you can see he meant it. He's hit it true.

"It's a great moment for us to win here. It's a great achievement, they must be very proud and so they should be. It was a special night for him and it was a special night for the club.

"We have to find a way tactically of being right, to accommodate the quality of attacking players we have."

The win was Newcastle's seventh in eight games and quickly erased memories of their 4-0 defeat at Wigan on Saturday.

"We criticised ourselves afterwards," Pardew admitted of the Wigan match. "Tactically we got it wrong but we talked about that.

"We changed tonight. We looked more solid and we still looked a massive threat. The reaction we got out there typifies the team. Every time you have a set-back, you have to bounce back.

Manchester City manager Roberto Mancini was among those in the crowd ahead of their trip to Newcastle next weekend, with both the title and Newcastle's European hopes on the line.

"It's all to play for," Pardew said. "We've got ourselves into a great position and you don't get into this kind of position without great players.

"We're as good as anyone. We've got two games left and we need to win them both.

"It's going to be a special day (against City), a team challenging for the title and team challenging for (the Champions League).

"If you would have told me that at the start of the season I wouldn't have believed it," he said.

Meanwhile, Chelsea manager Roberto Di Matteo refused to give up on Chelsea's fight for a top-four finish despite their most likely avenue to qualify for the Champions League being a win over Bayern Munich in the Champions League final.

With two games to play Chelsea are now four points off Newcastle and Tottenham in the Premier League amid two other huge games in the Champions League final and an FA Cup final with Liverpool.

"It's going to be difficult now for us to get fourth spot. The season has proven difficult. We will keep pushing to the end though – we won’t give up," Di Matteo said.

Eyebrows were raised when Di Matteo opted to leave out several key figures including Juan Mata, Ashley Cole, Didier Drogba and Frank Lampard.

"I always said I select teams to win games and that was my thinking tonight," he said.

"It was our sixth game in 17 days, we cannot ask the same players to go all the time. We have a good squad."