Where's the sense in sacking Chris Hughton?

Sunday's performance from the Newcastle United players, as in a few matches this season, was lacklustre at best. Fans who had battled through transport chaos to get to West Bromwich vented their frustration as they and their team froze at The Hawthorns.

But, even as the gloomy resignation to a poor defeat descended on those of us in the away end, a chant began to rise up from the Geordies behind the goal: "Chrissy Hughton's black and white army," they sang, over and over.

As Hughton held the Championship trophy aloft at St James' Park, the fans knew he had won it despite losing some very talented players the previous summer, despite spending a relatively small sum of money and despite nobody having even given him a chance of getting the job in the first place.

Chris Hughton has brought dignity, stability and a respectable Premier League placing to Newcastle United - so it should be no surprise that his reward from owner Mike Ashley is the sack.

Ashley's unsure touch on football matters has surfaced in the wayward decision-making of the past but, short of pleading with Kevin Keegan to return for a third term of office, few have been as unfathomable as the decision to remove Hughton less than eight months after the 51-year-old former Tottenham and Republic of Ireland defender took them back to the top tier.

And it has rightly been met with instant and widespread condemnation - most significantly from Newcastle supporters who know their former manager has been badly treated.

Ashley has not been pushed into this by growing pressure and unrest from fans. Newcastle's followers have been loyal and grateful to Hughton for restoring respect to their club and for the calm and measured manner in which he guided them back into the Premier League after only one season away.

Of course, the Magpies have had poor results this season, two of them coming in successive away games at Bolton and West Brom, the latter on Sunday presumably the final straw for Ashley and his fellow powerbrokers. It should also be remembered a creditable draw against Chelsea was sandwiched between these two results.

Newcastle are what they are - a newly promoted team - and Hughton was bound to experience bumps along the way. This is the way of things. Results can be mixed and heavy defeats come along occasionally but Ashley does not appear to have factored away wins at Everton and Arsenal into his calculations, or the hammerings handed out to Aston Villa and Sunderland at home.

The good news for Hughton is that he departs without a stain on his reputation and character while Ashley will no doubt face further accusations that he is out of touch with football's realities.

The farewell statement that accompanied Hughton out of the door at St James' Park was part-praise/part-insult as it read "an individual with more managerial experience is needed to take the club forward."

More managerial experience? From the club that asked legendary striker Alan Shearer to perform his first managerial task by trying to save them from relegation at the end of the 2008/09 campaign.

Take the club forward? Maybe something has been missed along the way but winning promotion from the Championship and putting Newcastle in mid-table in the Premier League sounds like decent advancement to most observers.

Hughton was getting his experience at Newcastle, although there was always the lingering suspicion that he was not quite high profile enough for those running the club. If you wanted headline grabbing quotes or flamboyant behaviour, Hughton was not your man. If you wanted basic decency and sound managerial common sense on a shoestring budget, then he was.

We should not patronise the former Tottenham defender and sympathise simply because this is unwarranted treatment of one of the game's nice guys. We should sympathise because he has lost a job he was doing perfectly well.

There is huge pressure on Ashley and his boardroom cohorts to prove that Alan Pardew is the right man and ease the mood of unrest his decision to cut off Hughton has created at St James' Park. And Ashley's track record will not inspire huge confidence.

Hughton, meanwhile, can only reflect on what a harsh and illogical profession football management can be, safe in the knowledge that he has more than enough credit in the bank to soon be receiving offers from elsewhere.

The fans do not crave a Messiah, they crave success. Under Hughton they looked like a football team. But that, apparently, is not on the board's agenda.