ALAN PARDEW last night said sorry for a foul-mouth spat with Manchester City counterpart Manuel Pellegrini at the height of Newcastle United's frustrations during a 2-0 defeat at St James' Park.

Pardew, frustrated along with every Magpies supporter on Tyneside yesterday, lost control of what he was saying during a tense first half in which he felt his team had scored a legitimate equaliser.

Shortly after a stunning volley from Cheik Tiote had been controversially ruled out for offside, Pardew and Pellegrini had to be separated on the touchline as half-time approached.

City's Chilean boss had called for his assistant, Brian Kidd, to have a word with the fourth official, Martin Atkinson, after hearing Pardew demand cautions for some of the actions of visiting players on the pitch. That sparked a reaction from the Newcastle boss, who was then caught by cameras mouthing to Pellegrini 'shut your noise' followed by expletives.

While the former Malaga boss claimed it was “not important” after the match, Pardew was keen to make amends.

“I hear that what I said has been picked up a bit and I apologise for my comments,” said Pardew. “It was a heat of the moment thing, words that we always have as managers, to a degree. I’ve apologised to him and I’m fortunate that he’s accepted them.”

He added: “I was frustrated today. And I think most Newcastle fans were, but I did not complain at every decision.

“I have said I have apologised for that particular word. You know, we always tease each other and have words. What he said to me is going to remain private, but it didn’t merit my response, to be honest.”

Pardew's tension had increased because of the Tiote incident which had looked to have pulled Newcastle level again.

The Ivorian's strike was ruled out by referee Mike Jones after a chat with his assistant, Stephen Child, had deemed Yoan Gouffran was standing in an active offside position in the City box.

Gouffran was not in Joe Hart's line of sight nor did he attempt to touch the ball as it arrowed towards goal, which led to Newcastle arguing he was inactive.

Pardew said: “Of course I'm frustrated. The goal that was disallowed set the tone for the game because we felt a huge injustice.

“I’ve gone and seen the referee and I was right behind the shot as the fourth official was and it was a clean strike. It was a great moment for this football club to get a goal like that so if you’re going to chalk it off you’ve got to make sure you’ve got the point right.

“My point was did he think Gouffran was interfering with Joe Hart and he said ‘he was in the six yard box’. I get that, the guy was recovering from an offside position but he didn’t want anything to do with the play.

“He was not interfering with Joe Hart’s vision. In fact it goes on the inside of him, it was City players impeding Joe’s vision, not Gouffran. It’s a real technical matter he's talking about here. And to chalk off a goal of that quality takes some doing. It set the tone for the rest of the game.

“If you’re going to call a guy retreating from the offside position it has to be pretty clear that he’s interfering with play. Neither the referee or the linesman could have been clear about that.

Even after that flash point, Newcastle pushed on in the hope of cancelling out Edin Dzeko's eighth minute opener. In the end, despite testing Hart on a few occasions, Alvaro Negredo made sure of the points with a stoppage-time second.

Pardew said: “I thought we were very good in a lot of areas, we didn’t let them dominate the game, we pressed and looked for opportunities, we had a couple of very good chances.

“Joe Hart made terrific saves from Yohan Cabaye and Loic Remy but I have to say when we play as well as that we usually get a result so full credit to Manchester City because they had to play very well to get that result.”

Newcastle will look to avoid a fifth successive defeat at West Ham United this Saturday, but there is likely to be transfer activity in the coming days.

Norwich City are interested in Jonas Gutierrez – who appeared to say his farewells to Newcastle fans on Twitter over the weekend – while Papiss Cisse has been the subject of an offer from a Qatar club.

Newcastle, closing in on a loan deal for Dutch forward Luuk De Jong, are not looking to sell unless they receive near the £9m fee they paid for Cisse.

The Senegal international is also understood to want to stay on Tyneside and recapture the sort of form which made him a hit with the fans when he scored 13 in 13 games following his move from Freiburg two years ago.

Pardew said: “I can’t confirm any bid for him for any club. Not that I’m aware of.”

The Newcastle manager also defended his full-back Mapou Yanga-Mbiwa for the challenge in the latter stages on Samir Nasri which has left the Frenchman fearing medial knee ligament damage.

Pardew, aware of suggestions Yanga-Mbiwa should have seen red card for it, said: “He made a point in his mind that he didn’t want him to get away and he was a bit rash in the challenge, but he’s not like that, so I hope Nasri’s okay."